


Watashitachi wa Roger kaizoku desu (we still stand proud)

by stereden



Series: Watashitachi wa Roger kaizoku desu [2]
Category: One Piece
Genre: Ace is going to live, Bitter!Buggy, Canon-Typical Violence, Competent!Buggy, Gen, In which the Roger Kaizoku get off their arses and intervene, Marineford AU, Rouge was a pirate i will die on that ship, Sengoku is a drama queen, Shanks and Buggy were really fucking young when they joined the crew okay?, Still an asshole though, and that's not even me making shit up that's actually canon, and where the fuck where they during Marineford?, badass Roger Kaizoku, but a damn good orator, half of them are OC because we don't know anything about that crew, like not even ten years old young, not nuns, swearing because they're pirates, the Roger Kaizoku are pissed off, this explains so much about both of them, this wasn't even supposed to be about him but I'm still bitter too, why do we now so little about them?, with damn good reasons
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-09
Updated: 2019-04-27
Packaged: 2019-05-20 00:33:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 66,412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14884211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stereden/pseuds/stereden
Summary: The Roger Pirates disappeared after their Captain's death, and were happy enough to let the Marines forget about them.Until the Marines decide to execute their Captain's son, that is.





	1. Come all you young sailor men, listen to me, I'll sing you a song of the fish in the sea

**Author's Note:**

> So this was inspired by more random late-night musing about the Roger Kaizoku. And then I started to think about Marineford, and how it could have gone if that crew had intervened. So. Have a take at what could have been, mostly seen through Crocus's eyes, from Ace's first foray into the Grand Line to the mess that is Marineford and its aftermath.  
> Viper, if you're reading this, this is all your fault for making me think about this again.  
> Basically, assignments have been handed in and I finally have time to write fanfic again!  
> (title is courtesy of Google translate and is supposed to say "We are the Roger Pirates" but feel free to correct me)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crocus of the Twin Capes, they call him. He who sits at the bottom of Reverse Mountain and greets all who venture to the Grand Line.
> 
> Some laugh. Some stare. Some stop to chat. And some he grabs by the ear and drags into his house for a medical exam.
> 
> The young man with an eerily familiar face and an even more familiar name is one of the laters.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Title comes from the shanty "Fish in the Sea"

> Come all you young sailor men, listen to me,
> 
> I'll sing you a song of the fish in the sea 
> 
> (Fish in the sea)
> 
> * * *
> 
>  

Crocus of the Twin Capes, they call him. He who sits at the bottom of Reverse Mountain and greets all who venture to the Grand Line.

Some laugh. Some stare. Some stop to chat. And some he grabs by the ear and drags into his house for a medical exam.

The young man with an eerily familiar face and an even more familiar name is one of the laters.

* * *

 

“I’m one of the best doctors in the damn world, brat, and you’re not leaving my house until I’m damn sure that you’re not going to die on your crew!” Crocus decrees, glaring at the young man in front of him. “I swear on Laboon’s head I mean you no harm, but you’re not getting out of a complete examination. In fact," he turns to the rest of the crew. "All of you are getting a free check-up, and do me a favour and find yourself a damn medic soon!”

He then turns back to a fuming Portgas D. Ace.

“I know exactly who you are, young man, and trust me when I say I have good reasons to want to give you a check-up. Now, do we do this the easy way or do I have to knock you out? I swear to Davy Jones, you D’s are going to drive me nuts…” He mutters.

In the end, it's the Spade’s second in command who convinces his captain to at least humour the doctor, pointing out that they had all been roughed up by their arrival in the Grand Line.

“Who the fuck are you and what do you know about me?” Ace spits out as soon as he is alone with the Doctor.

“My name’s Crocus and I was the doctor on the Oro Jackson. Sit on the table, please. Your father had an incurable disease and these kinds of things have the bad habit of being genetic. I’ll be damned if you have to chose between dying on your sick bed or giving yourself up to go out in a blaze of glory like that moron did.”

Biting back a retort, Ace obeys, paler than he had been when he entered the room. “Disease?”

Humming as he readies a needle, the doctor nods.

“Hm. It started about four years before we got to Raftel. That’s why he recruited me, originally. I managed to extend his life expectancy by a couple of years, but in the end it was either a prolonged agony or a pirate’s death. He didn’t want to put the crew or your mother through the former, so he chose the latter. What happened to Rouge, anyway? I didn’t even know she had a kid, and I would have thought she would have brought you here to make sure you didn’t have that fucking disease.”

He regrets asking as soon as the words leave his mouth.

“She died the day I was born. She extended her pregnancy to twenty months in order to avoid the purges."

Crocus winces even as his medical curiosity tries to figure out how the hell she had managed such a feat. “Damn. Sorry, kiddo. I met her a few times. Tough as nails and one of the most stubborn pirate I’ve ever met. Reckless as hell, too, drove her crew mad.”

Ace gapes.

“My mother was a pirate?” He yelpes, causing the doctor to frown deeply.

“Are you kidding me? Who the hell raised you, kid, that you weren’t even told that?”

Ace shrugs. “Garp dropped me off with mountain bandits when I was like two months old.”

It's Crocus’s turn to gape.

“ _Garp?_ That’s it, I’m going to kill Roger again when it’s my time to join Davy Jones. There’s no way in the seven seas that Rouge would have let that stand if he’d told her about it beforehand. She loathed Monkey with a passion. I mean, I can see Captain’s reasoning, screwed up as it is, but come the fuck on. He didn’t tell anyone in our crew! I bet the Blackjack’s don’t know about you either! And then he goes and leaves you with Marine Hero Ironfist Garp. I can’t even blame the illness, moron was always making stupid decisions like that…” He rants as he takes a few blood samples. “Do me a favour and actually _listen_ to your ship’s doctor when you get one. We are not paid enough to deal with D’s on a daily basis."

He puts the samples away and takes out a stethoscope.

“Deep breaths please. Anyway, you probably don’t want to hear me curse your old man in the grave, you want to hear about Rouge. Cough twice. Again. Blackjack Rouge, the Queen of Spade - that’s why I thought you knew, what with your crew’s name. I bet that gave Monkey a heart attack - captain of the Blackjack pirates and certified menace. She was of the adventuring sort, always getting herself in trouble. Reckless as hell too, as I said. She fought with a bo staff most of the time, but her hand to hand was pretty good too. Decent bounty, I’m pretty sure I still have one of her posters somewhere for old time’s sake. We used to get into small skirmishes with them every few months or so, never seriously though. More like training exercices than anything, really.”

“What were her nakama like?” Ace asks hesitantly, opening his mouth wide to let the doctor check his throat.

Crocus’ mouth twitches.

“Fucking terrifying, the lot of them. I don’t quite know how she managed it, but she surrounded herself with some of the strongest, scariest women of our era, and the men were nothing to scoff at either…

* * *

Crocus smiles as he sends the Spades on their way. They’re good guys, decent nakama too if their immediate reaction when he had taken one look at their captain before dragging him to his examination room was anything to judge by.

The kid had fought him all the way, but the old doctor had dealt with worse patients before.

Yes, Crocus thinks as the ship disappears on the horizon. The kid would be alright. He had tested negative to the disease that would have killed his father if the moron hadn’t chosen Marines as cause of death, he had a good crew and as good a head on his shoulders as any D would ever have.

He eyes an inconspicuous notebook sitting on a shelf. He had told Ace that no one knew where the rest of the Oro Jackson crew had gone, and the kid had been more interested in the Blackjacks anyway, but that wasn’t exactly the truth.

He’d told the kid to seek out Shakky in Sabaody. If he happened to meet Rayleigh there, well. And the boy had mentioned tracking Shanks down to thank him for something, so that’s two down.

There’s no need to sick the rest of the mob on him, at least not now, especially with Ace being so susceptible about his father.

_~~(Oh captain, what did you do?)~~ _

Still, he thinks as he sends a message to the Newspaper office, it’s always a good idea to keep them somewhat informed. If only to limit the collateral damage before one of them opens their big mouth.

* * *

 

_Harried Gardener to Stubborn weeds._

_Found out that two of my rarest flowers crossbred. Unexpected results, but I think I’ll leave it alone and observe for now. This could be interesting._

 


	2. Unser Schiff gleitet stolz durch die schäumenden Wogen, jetzt strafft der Wind uns're Segel mit Macht. Seht ihr hoch droben die Fahne sich wenden, die blutrote Fahne, ihr Seeleut, habt acht.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ace is going to hate this, Crocus thinks as he rings up the newspaper office and places another ad.There will be no hiding whose son he is after this, and Roger’s crew coming to his rescue would just add to the public reveal Sengoku was no doubt already planning. But this is Captain’s son, and they will be damned before they let the kid be executed just because his father had been a pain in the marine’s ass. If anything, they should be coming after them, the Roger Kaizoku, not Newgate’s second commander.
> 
> Assholes, all of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sengoku's speech, Ace's replies and any lines you recognise come directly from the manga.  
> Buggy invited himself in this story and I'm keeping him because I am STILL BITTER about how he got shafted in the manga. If you've read "Ore Wa Roger Kaizokudesu (it used to mean something)", you know what I mean. If you haven't, I can only recommend it, but Buggy's bitterness will be explored in further chapters.
> 
> Title is from German sea shanty "Wir lieben die Stürme" (We love the storms)

> Unser Schiff gleitet stolz durch die schäumenden Wogen, (Our ship proudly glides through the foaming waves)
> 
> jetzt strafft der Wind uns're Segel mit Macht. (The wind now tightens our sails with might.)
> 
> Seht ihr hoch droben die Fahne sich wenden, (See the flag turning up above,)
> 
>  
> 
> die blutrote Fahne, ihr Seeleut, habt acht. (The blood-red flag, you sailors take heed!)
> 
> (Wir lieben die Stürme)
> 
>  

* * *

The call comes from their archeologist slash spymaster, Marian.

“ **_Portgas D. Ace has been defeated by Blackboard and handed over to the Marines to be executed for ‘being Whitebeard’s second commander’.”_ **

The tense tone of her voice lets him know exactly what she thinks of the whole situation and of the reason behind the scheduled execution.

“I’m hoisting the colours.” He announces. “Where?”

_“ **Marineford. in a month. The official announcement will come out a week before.** ” _

“Noted. Meeting point is Shakky’s, three days before.”

The DenDen nods.

“ **_I probably would still want to do something if he truly was to be executed for his actions as a Spade or as a Shirohige Kaizoku, but this is unforgivable,_ ** ” The archeologist spits out. “ _**I’ll try to contact the Blackjacks, unless you have their number? I think I know where to find some of them at least, they can call the rest**.” _

“You do that. It’s going to be enough of a pain tracking everyone else down.” Crocus mutters as he throws a few things in a bag before looking at his medical supplies and grabbing another bag. “The Oro Jackson is still in Water Seven with our favourite Shipwright, so I better call them first.”

 **“** _**Ironic, isn’t it, that no one has noticed it in over twenty years?** ” _ Marian snickers. “ **_People are idiots. Anyway, I’m going to get Yadomaru and tell her to get her people moving. See you at Shakky’s, old man.”_ **

* * *

Ace is going to hate this, Crocus thinks as he rings up the newspaper office and places another ad.There will be no hiding whose son he is after this, and Roger’s crew coming to his rescue would just add to the public reveal Sengoku was no doubt already planning. But this is Captain’s son, and they will be damned before they let the kid be executed just because his father had been a pain in the marine’s ass. If anything, they should be coming after them, the Roger Kaizoku, not Newgate’s second commander.

Assholes, all of them.

* * *

_Harried Gardener to Stubborn weeds._

_The neighbourhood association is trying to get rid of some of my rarer plants because they offend their aesthetics. Will be at the usual place in three weeks to see if anyone wants to take them off my hands. Any help is welcome._

 

* * *

At the news office in Alabasta, one of the editor frowns before requesting an assignment to Sabaody.

* * *

On Elbaf, a giant stops his fight to grab the newspaper, then knocks his opponent out and steals his boat.

* * *

On Weather Island, an elderly woman gets a call and packs her bags.

* * *

On Conomi Island, a former sniper hands her prize to the girl who just got bullseye at her carnaval booth, then turns away the next customer. Her denden mushi just rang five time before falling silent.

* * *

Somewhere in Paradise, a one armed, red-haired drunkard takes a look at the newspaper and puts the alcohol away regretfully. There’s not enough alcohol in the world to deal with this kind of crap anyway.

* * *

On the Baratie, somewhere near the Calm Belt, a cook sighs before turning in his apron.

* * *

On Water Seven, Iceburg gapes as one of his oldest shipwrights hands in his resignation without warning. The woman had been working there for over twenty years, but she leaves without looking back. Underneath her house, the Oro Jackson is ready to sail.

* * *

On Fishman island, an Orca-man nearly crushes the DenDen in his hand. It’s time to swim up again, it seems.

* * *

In a bar in Sabaody, two old friends gaze at each other.

“I’ll prepare the rooms and stock up on the good stuff, then,” Shakky says, exhaling smoke. “Try not to get sold as a slave again until then?”

* * *

All over the seas, on both sides of the Red Line, bags are packed, weapons polished and ships heave their anchors.

It’s been twenty-two years since they last sailed together. They’re retired, as much as people like them can be, but it doesn’t matter. This is important. This is their captain’s boy, a son they stayed away from to protect, a young man condemned not for any action of his own (they wouldn’t intervene if that were the case, it would have been an insult towards Ace’s achievements and choices) but for the blood that flows through his veins, for the crimes of a father he has never met and a dream he isn’t even chasing. This is about honor, about respect, about justice even, the sacrosanct “justice” the Marine wave as a flag even as they twist its meaning.

It’s been twenty-two years, and the Roger Kaizoku will remind the World Government that there’s a reason they could never catch any of them until their captain gave himself up.

* * *

(In a cell in Impel Down, a pirate keeps to himself as he wonders if the rest of his crew managed to escape the marines.

He doesn’t think about the Roger Kaizoku. None of them have thought about him in a long, long time, with one exception. He is done hoping.)

 

* * *

* * *

The meet up in Shakky’s bar three days before the scheduled execution. All of them are there, except for Gulliver and the cabin brats. But the giant would be here soon, and Shanks had warned them that he had to put the fear of him into Kaido before coming, as the youngest Yonkou was making a try on Whitebeard’s territory, and that he might not get there until the last minute. Special mention was made of a false D that needed a thorough ass-kicking followed by an old-fashioned beheading and burning of the body for good measure. Marian had been detailed in her description of Blackbeard’s devil fruit, and such power could not be left unchecked.

Buggy, Crocus learns, has been in Impel Down for a few months now.

It’s the first time in twenty-two years that all of them are together again. It feels good, even if the reason is dire and Roger’s absence direly felt. The Oro Jackson is moored not far away, camouflaged to look like a normal ship. Seagull commandeered Shakky’s kitchen as soon as he got there, while Scopper Gaban polishes his axe in a corner. Marian is talking animatedly with Bullseye Riza as she counts her bullets, the archeologist sharpening her knives. Elena, their navigator, is arguing with Shakky about the best routes to take while Roban does kata to one side. Rush, their shipwright, is assuring Rayleigh that the Oro Jackson is in top condition despite over two decades of disuse.

As if any of them had expected any differently. The steadfast ship had lived through the Ed War with little to no damage, and Rush had always been meticulous in her repairs. The ship Tom had built them was still a masterpiece, and he can’t wait to be onboard again.

“Gulliver just arrived,” Rayleigh says, standing up. “Let’s take this to the ship and plan our course of action.”

“Aye aye sensho!” The crew roars in delight.

It’s good to be together again, Crocus thinks, and he smiles.

* * *

The plaza was filled to the brim with Marines. Over a hundred thousand of them had been recalled, fifty battleships surrounding the island, cannons everywhere. It wouldn’t be enough to prevent Whitebeard from coming, but as long as the fight stayed on the ground the marines had the advantage.

Around the world, people watched with anticipation as Portgas D. Ace was brought up to the execution platform three hours before the scheduled time, and Sengoku took a speaker Denden to address the crowd of marines. And, with them, the rest of the World.

“Men, I have something crucial to tell you all. Something about the true meaning of Portgas D. Ace... meeting his end here today...!”

He pauses dramatically.

“Ace. Tell me the name of your father.”

“My father?” Ace chuckles dryly. “Huh. At a time like this... My father... is Whitebeard!”

“He is not!”

Ace raises his head, eyes burning.

“Yes he is! Whitebeard is my only father! I have no other!”

Sengoku ignores his answer.

“Back then, we searched as though our lives depended on it. Searching for the possibility that there existed on that island a child of that man. Based on nothing but the tiniest of leads from Cipher Pol, we investigated all newborn children, all children who were yet to be born and all of their mothers, but ultimately found nothing. Or so we thought. But out of pure obstinacy, your mother had risked her life to perform a certain trick with regard to your birth! And it was this trick that deceived our eyes! In the South Blue, there lies an island by the name of Baterilla. Your mother's name was... Portgas D. Rouge! She performed a feat that we could never have hoped to imagine and, out of devotion to her child, bore him in her womb for a full twenty months! And when the birth finally came, her strength all but spent, she left the world as you entered it. One year and three months from the father's death... a child was born bearing the most accursed blood to be found in this world. That child is you. Do not claim you are not aware!”

 

* * *

Hidden in the water, in front of Whitebeard’s incoming allies, the Roger Kaizoku wince as one as they watch Sengoku’s speech.

“Oh boy.” Elena mutters. “If the Blackjacks weren’t already furious, this would do it. No mention of Rouge having been a pirate at all? Reducing her to Ace’s mother and Roger’s piece on the side?”

Crocus nods in agreement. Yadomaru was going to explode about this. They could only hope the Blackjacks would stick to the plan, at least for now.

 

* * *

“Your father is none other than pirate King Gol D. Roger!” Sengoku announces loudly, shocking people all across the seas.

 

* * *

“Drama queen” Riza spits out. “Rush, you’re on.”

Their shipwright nods and grabs a denden.

 

* * *

“So what?” A voice yells, seemingly from within the crowd of Marines. Sengoku frowns, but goes on, ignoring it.

“Two years ago, it was... choosing to take your mother's name... you had risen with frightening speed and remarkable power to notability as captain of the Spade Pirates. It was then that we finally realised... that Roger's blood still lived on! But Whitebeard, who came to the same realisation just as we did, chose to take in the son of his old rival onto his own ship, so that he might raise him to be the next pirate King!”

“No! I joined his crew so that I could make HIM the pirate king!” Ace protests, but Sengoku barrels on.

“You are the only one who believes that. We were unable to lay a finger on you from that moment forth. You were being protected by Whitebeard himself! And if I were to allow you to roam free for long enough, you would be sure, slowly but surely, to obtain the necessary calibre to stand at the summit of a new era of piracy!That is why it is absolutely imperative that we take your head here today! Even if that means going to war with Whitebeard himself!”

* * *

Just as he finishes his speech, the same voice interrupts again.

“Not that we would dare to deny Newgate his right to kick your ass,” It resounds around Marineford, carried by the multiple speakers originally meant to project Sengoku’s voice only. “But it seems that you forgot to include some important variable in this equation.”

* * *

The Marines are looking around frantically now, trying to pinpoint the speaker. Their panic rises further when the Gates of Justice open seemingly on their own, revealing Whitebeard’s allies.

“Where is Whitebeard?” Sengoku roars. “We need confirmation!”

“Wild Knight Doma! Thunder Lord McGuy! The Decalvan brothers! Vortex Spider Squardo! A terrifying group, all of them captains who have made a name for themselves in the new world! There are 43 ships in all! Whitebeard’s division commanders are nowhere to be seen, but these are, without a doubt, all pirates affiliated with Whitebeard!” One of his underlings replies. “Do we attack?”

“Not yet!” He barks. “Whitebeard is sure to be nearby! He must have some kind of plan! Scan the seas!”

“The speaker must be on one of these…” Kizaru muses.

Just as he says that, however, bubbles start to appear in front of the armada, at level with the now opened Gates of Justice.

“Could it be…” Sengoku starts, only to be interrupted again.

“We would like to set the record straight on a few things. Most notably the fact that the Pirate King was never actually _captured._ He gave himself up because he was dying anyway and wanted to go out with a bang. Oh, and the fact that Portgas D. Rouge was better known as Blackjack D. Rouge, the Queen of Spade and captain of the Blackjack pirates.”

Even more bubbles were rising to the surface now.

“But most importantly.” The voice gains a heavy dose of sarcasm. “ _What the fuck made you think we would let you execute our captain’s son?”_

* * *

The Oro Jackson breaks through the water, Jolly Roger flying high, her crew standing tall on the bridge, arms crossed and face closed.

“That’s Dark King Rayleigh!” Someone yells. “Scopper Gaban, Seagull, Gulliver, Bullseye Riza… It’s the Roger Kaizoku!”

Pandemonium descends on the plaza, not helped in the least by Rayleigh taking a step forward and unleashing his King’s Haki on them, causing half of the marines to collapse, foaming at the mouth.

“If you want to execute Newgate’s second commander, at least do it for his actions as a Shirohige Kaizoku.” The Dark King chides the fleet Admiral in a condescending tone, as if talking to a small child. “That would be acceptable. A stupid move, certainly, as it would gain you Newgate’s ire which is never a comfortable thing, but an acceptable one.”

He pauses, eyes locked on Sengoku’s despite the distance between them.

“But if you want to get rid of Gol D. Roger’s legacy, at least have the balls to come after us who sailed with him rather than condemn a young man for the actions of a man who died fifteen months before he was even born.”

The remaining marines are shaking now. Behind Ace, the three admirals stand up, ready to intervene. Monkey D. Garp makes his way back to the platform, staring at the Oro Jackson as if seeing a ghost.

Surprisingly, or not, Ace is the one who breaks the silence. In a very D. way.

“What the fuck are you doing?!” He roars. “I told Crocus I wanted nothing to do with your crew!”

“Oh, don’t worry brat, we’re leaving the actual rescue to Newgate and his people.” Said Doctor waves Ace’s words away. “We’re mostly here because these guys didn’t have the guts to come after us and chose to use you as their yearly publicity stunt instead, so we decided to remind them why, exactly, they never managed to catch any of us. Besides, it’s been ages since most of us were in a good fight, we simply couldn’t resist the opportunity to shake off the rust a bit.”

As if to prove his point, Riza shoots the Marine flag with an exploding bullet.

“Are we going to fight or what?” She complains, eyes locked on the execution platform.

“Just a few moments of patience, Bullseye,” Rayleigh chuckles. “I do believe the Shirohige Kaizoku have first dibs.”

Just as he finishes his sentence, the Moby Dick and three other Whitebeard ships break the surface inside the walls. All the commanders were standing on the deck, along with their infamous captain.

“I hope you’re not planning on absconding with one of my precious sons, Rayleigh.”

Despite having his back to the Oro Jackson, Edward Newgate addresses them first, though his eyes never leave Ace.

“My patience has already been severely tested.”

“Maa maa, don’t worry Newgate. As we just told Fire-Fist, we’re leaving the rescue to you. We’re just here to express our disappointment and remind the Marines of what happens when you piss us off. Portgas is all yours. We’re here because we’re Roger’s legacy, the ones who sailed to Raftel and saw the One Piece, and it’s insulting that the World Government thinks that a boy who has never even met our captain is a bigger threat to their precious order.”

“And we’re here because some fucker insulted our captain by insinuating that she was just an ordinary civilian girl who was deceived by their captain’s non-existent charm!” A woman growls from inside the plaza, appearing on the platform just behind Garp, a massive pole in her hands. All around the plaza, people begin to appear as if an illusion had been lifted, all of them bearing the mark of the Blackjack pirates.

“We’ll meet up with you later Whitebeard, to ensure that your kid gets at least some stories about Rouge and to talk about the good old days with some quality sake, but for now I have a Marine Hero to castrate and you have a Nibantai taicho to rescue.”

And with that, she swings her pole around, catching Garp in the stomach and sending him flying.

As if that had been the signal everyone had been waiting for, all hell breaks loose. Everything starts happening at once, and Crocus struggles to keep track of it all.

Newgate creates a tsunami, which Aokiji promptly freezes, then regrets when the Division Commanders use his ice to get to the plaza. Kizaru goes for Newgate’s head, but is intercepted by the first commander, Marco the Phoenix. Akainu rushes towards the Oro Jackson, magma fist at the ready, only to lose it to a haki-infused axe swing from Scopper. Yadomaru, Rouge’s former first mate and now the captain of the Blackjacks by default, is clearly relieving some tension on Monkey D. Garp by beating him to a pulp while the rest of her crew has some fun with the run-of-the-mill marines still standing.

Crocus himself is dealing with Vice-Admiral Tsuru, and trying his very best to avoid getting transformed into laundry, swearing all the while. The woman was old guard, and only sexism and the limited number of Admiral positions kept her at her current rank.

Speaking of Admirals, Aokiji, the last one, is locked in a three way fight against Elena, one of Newgate’s commanders (the short one, Haruta if Crocus’ memory isn’t failing him) and the blonde medic of the Blackjack’s who hadn’t even eaten the Strength fruit and could still punch craters into concrete if she wished.

* * *

Then a ship falls from the sky, revealing Straw Hat Luffy and a bunch of prison escapees, and the chaos only grows bigger. Because why not?

“Fucking D’s” he mutters under his breath, catching the commiserating glance Tsuru sends him.

Fuck. He doesn’t like agreeing with her. But still.

“Fucking Monkey Ds.” He adds, and she snorts.

Wait.

Is that Buggy?

In the lull cause by the falling ship, Crocus tries to catch the former cabin’s boy’s attention.

But Buggy is looking at the Oro Jackson as if he can’t believe it’s there, then visibly steels himself as he turns away to make a grand declaration, standing with Strawhat Luffy, Emporio Ivankov (what even was the Revolutionary doing there?), Fishman Shichibukai Jinbe and former Shichibukai Crocodile.

He doesn't look at any of the Roger Kaizoku.

“Luffy!” Ace yells over the sound of battle. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“I finally found you!” His brother replies just as loudly, a wide smile on his face.

* * *

The sound of Garp having an apoplexy is music on Crocus’s ears at this point. But a second glance at the young man has him ready to kill Dragon once this mess is over. Because the brat is sporting all the signs of one of Ivankov’s “miracle cures” and not matter his fruit, the okama queen is NOT a qualified medical professional and the Strawhat should still be resting if he's been inject with the damn thing. And because the Chief Revolutionary has left his son to be raised by _Garp_ , despite having grown up with the man himself, without having Roger’s excuse of being terminally ill when he made that decision and then too dead to rectify it.

For fucks’ sake, is no one on this planet capable of being a decent parent? Newgate adopted over 1600 “sons” and “daughters”, and apparently did a stellar job of it given how capable and loyal they all were. So why is it that those who were lucky enough to have their own kids can’t be arsed to take care of them properly?

Thankfully, the Monkey brat is very much not his problem. Nope. Shanks made him is responsibility when he gave him Captain’s hat and then proceeded to talk Crocus’s ear off about the damn brat.

And Ace has Newgate - for how long, Crocus can’t say, because the man is pretty damn old and his life-style and love of alcohol means that his chief nurse is definitely keeping a close eye on him, a good hint that the old man didn’t have long left. But that crew is strong, united, their bonds stronger than most of the crews Crocus had ever heard of.

 

They will be fine.

 

Meanwhile, Crocus has a fight of his own to get back to, a crew to keep in one piece (no pun intended) and, once this is mess is over, an apprentice to track down.

 

Because Buggy has not looked at any of them since he got there.

And Crocus has a nasty feeling that this talk is not going to go well.


	3. Leave her, Johnny, leave her Oh, leave her, Johnny, leave her For the voyage is done and the winds do blow And it's time for us to leave her

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Buggy inhales.
> 
> Crocus never leaves his lighthouse. Rayleigh rarely leaves Sabaody. He hasn’t heard from any of them in over twenty years, but he knows, from the information Shanks shares with him, that none of them stayed in the same place. There hasn’t been more than two of them on the same island in over two decades.
> 
> And yet here they are, all gathered together, and that means that this is planned. That they knew Captain had had a son and that that son was scheduled for execution.
> 
> All of them had known.
> 
> And none of them had told him. None of them had thought that maybe he deserved to know that his captain had left a legacy. Not a single one of them.
> 
> And that. That hurts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Buggy has taken over this story. He wasn't supposed to, but he makes some very good points and has managed to bring me to his side. Hence, the next few chapters will probably alternate between Buggy's point of view and Crocus's view of the same events. This also why a story that was supposed to be a funny story about the Roger Kaizoku kicking the Marines ass a la R.E.D. (Retired Extremely Dangerous, aka the most hilarious spy flick ever) has turned into an angst-ridden reunion fic. I regret nothing.  
> Buggy is turning out to be very interesting to write, very introspective. Crocus is harder for me, and I might at some point change his point of view for one of the other Roger Kaizoku (probably Rayleigh, because let's face it he's the only one we know anything about, Scopper Gaban and Seagull were only ever named, and much as I love my OCs, they're mostly here to fill the gaps in intel on this crew while I'm trying to focus on canon characters for this story)  
> Also, Buggy uses the term 'monster' quite often when speaking about his former crew, the Whitebeards, and any extremely strong people around. I got the idea from Nami and Usopp talking about the 'monster trio'. This is not (always) in reference to said people's humanity, but rather of the terrifying difference in strength and power between them and 'normal', 'average' people and pirates, and how terrifying it can be for one of the laters to be confronted with the formers.
> 
> Fair warning, Buggy's chapters are... not going to be friendly towards anyone who sailed on the Oro Jackson, save for Shanks. He is a subjective narrator, and his recollection of events will differ from Crocus' on a number of points, especially in their attitude towards these events. He is very, very bitter towards them, with good reasons, though they aren't quite the heartless bastards he's come to see them as either, which I'm going to try to convey some more in Crocus' chapters.
> 
> Chapter title is from the shanty "Leave her Johnny" where "her" references a ship.

> Leave her, Johnny, leave her   
>  Oh, leave her, Johnny, leave her   
>  For the voyage is done and the winds do blow   
>  And it's time for us to leave her
> 
> (Leave her Johnny)
> 
> * * *
> 
>  

The past few days had been a rollercoaster of highs and lows for Buggy the Clown. But then again, that was to be expected when in the company of the menace known as Monkey D Luffy. How the boy had survived so long is a complete mystery, given how reckless he is. Buggy doesn’t think the Strawhat even knows what self preservation means.

It is yet another uncomfortable reminder of his former captain. Buggy could have done without it.

At least he had been true to his word and had gotten them all out of Impel Down. And somehow, in the middle of their escape, Buggy had found himself with over a hundred people calling him ‘captain’ and worshipping the ground he walks on. It’s flattering. It’s everything he’s been pretending to want for the past decade.

He hates it. Hates that these men have put their lives on his shoulders, hates that he is now responsible for them when he has never agreed to be, hates that they look at him like he hung the sky when he has done nothing to warrant it. Hates that they aren’t the men he left behind when the marines captured him, the ones who actually know him and follow him nonetheless. Hates that he still doesn’t know if his men managed to escape or not. Hates that this will put an even bigger target on all their heads when all he had ever wanted was to be a small-time pirate that could gather treasure without being chased by the marines.

Buggy isn’t Gol D. Roger, never has been, never wants to be. Even without a devil fruit, his captain had been a right monster. So had the rest of the crew.

Oh, most of them had been perfectly decent people, most of the time, but Buggy remembers all too well how his captain had once utterly annihilated the military force of one country over a perceived insult. The others had been all too happy to join in. All of them had lived for battle, in a way, though they didn’t always look for it (there was no need, not with their captain’s uncanny ability to land himself in trouble time and time again). And all of them had been true monsters in strength.

Not many knew that none of the Roger Kaizoku had eaten a devil fruit, except for Buggy and even then it had been an accident. Losing the ability to swim had been terrifying, even if being basically invulnerable to non-haki enhanced bladed weapons had been reassuring. But the fact remains that the Roger Kaizoku had been monsters in their own right, without needing the crutch of a devil fruit. Roger’s and Rayleigh’s King’s Haki alone had been weapons of mass incapacitation in their own right, and the others had all had their own frightening strengths. Even Shanks, who had already been developing into a feared swordsman back then, and whose own King’s haki had awoken at a young age.

But Buggy? Buggy has always been average. His capacity to survive anything thrown at him is more a reflection of his self-preservation instincts than anything else. Back on the Oro Jackson, he had been both the youngest and the weakest, surrounded by monsters who would happily fight other monsters head-on while Buggy cowered inside the ship. Rayleigh had despaired of him even as he beat the two lower branches of haki into Buggy. He had taken to them like a fish to water, but that hadn’t changed his behaviour during battles in the slightest. The only times he would join a fight had been if he hadn’t had any other choice or if one of the others was in mortal danger (that had only happened twice, once with Shanks and once with his captain, and both had thanked him but none of the others had noticed and Buggy didn’t bring attention to it. Not when Riza and Marian were comparing scores, not when Elena was busy barking orders to get them away from the wreckages before they dragged them down to the seafloor with them, not when Rush was still cleaning her bloody wrenches next to Scopper who was doing the same with his axe).

And Roger had never judged him for it. His captain had simply told him that everyone fought for different reasons, and that it was fine if Buggy hadn’t found his reason yet, or if his reasons were different from the rest of the crew. Had squeezed his shoulder and told him to remember that, for Roger, Buggy was one the things he fought for, so he was fine with Buggy fighting to protect himself first and foremost.

(And then their captain had gone and left them all behind, left everything he had fought for behind and handed himself over to the Marines, and Buggy, who had just begun to think that this man was someone he could try fighting for, had to watch as the closest thing he had ever had to a father was beheaded right in front of him.)

(Buggy would never forgive Gol D. Roger for that.)

But here he is now, with newly escaped prisoners thinking him a great pirate captain and swearing to follow him, when all he wants to do is to get off this ship and back to East Blue, back to his crew who has better be intact, back to their calm little part of the world where there were no monsters ready to pounce on you as soon as your back was turned.

But of course he can’t, not with Strawhat determined to rescue his beloved brother (how the heck are they related anyway, him and Fire-Fist? And what is all the fuss about anyway? Yeah the brat is Whitebeard’s second commander, but that shouldn’t warrant such a spectacle). And Ivankov has decided that he and his revolutionaries would help, for whatever reason, and Buggy and the others had been brought along without so much as a by-your-leave. He’s trying to make the best of it, he really is, but right now he is seriously considering throwing himself overboard. He hadn’t signed up for getting involved in a war between Whitebeard and the Marines, Davy Jones damn them all! He’s way too much aware of his own abilities for that!

Buggy doesn’t have anything against Portgas per se. He’s as much a menace as his little brother, true, and had kicked Buggy’s ass before he left East Blue, but he had seemed rational enough, for a D at least. It had been clear even back then that he would grow up to be a monster, though, and Buggy had had enough of those for three lifetimes at least. He had heard on the grapevine that he had refused a Shichibukai title, and then his next bounty had reported that he had joined the Whitebeards and Buggy had stopped caring. That was another bunch of monsters that he wanted nothing to do with.

(He had tried not to think of the previous bunch of monsters, the ones who had made it clear that _they_ didn’t want anything to do with him anymore now that captain was gone.)

So he has no particular attachment or grudge to lay on Portgas’ door. Buggy has no reason to want anything to do with either side of the war that is about to begin. But life is a bitch and he doesn’t get a choice in the matter.

Story of his fucking life.

That doesn’t mean he plans on getting involved more than he has to to keep himself alive. As soon as he sees an opening, he’s going to be out of there before anyone notices his presence. And if he has to sacrifice a few of his new ‘followers’ to do so, well. Most of them had actually deserved to rot in Impel Down. The world wouldn’t miss them much. Buggy certainly wouldn’t. There were a few of the younger ones who had just been at the wrong place at the wrong time, and those are the ones he’ll try to take with him to work the ship he’s going to steal and then drop them somewhere for them to reconsider their life choices, but the rest of them can die in a ditch for all he cares.

 

* * *

 

Fucking D’s.

It starts with Ivankov letting it slip that the Strawhat’s father is Revolutionary Dragon. Which is bad enough, even if Buggy wants to laugh and point at Garp’s face at some point because really? The son of the Hero of the Marines went and became the leader of the Revolution and his grandson wants to be the Pirate King? The part of Buggy that will never forgive Monkey D. Garp for arresting his captain is bathing in schadenfreude. Another part of him is trying to figure out how the hell someone as smart as Dragon can be related to either Garp or Strawhat, the later in particular given how fucking _dumb_ the brat is.

And then Strawhat reveals that Portgas is not Dragon’s son.

He is Roger’s.

‘Firefist’ Portgas D. Ace is Gol D. Roger’s son and Buggy doesn’t want to believe it, doesn’t want to believe that his captain had a son and didn’t tell anyone about it, until he remembers the Baterilla slaughter, Shanks’s face when they heard about it in a bar, how they had tried to get people out, but arrived too late, how his fellow former cabin brat hadn’t been sober since as he drank to try and forget the horrors he saw in South Blue. The Marines had been looking for a child back then, for Roger’s child he realises now though he doesn’t think Shanks had, back then.

(Because, as reluctant as he is to admit, Shanks is his best friend, his brother in all but blood, and as much as the man irritates him he wouldn’t have kept that from him. Not so soon after Captain’s execution.)

Fuck. Captain had a kid. A kid that is about to be executed for his father’s sins, if what he’s hearing is true.

And, fuck. Buggy doesn’t want to fight in this war, doesn’t want to get involved, but this is Captain’s son. Whitebeard and Strawhat and their allies will be there too, will be trying to save him, and Buggy cannot, will not interfere with that unless there is no other way.

But he can’t leave either, now, not until this situation is resolved one way or the other. He owes it to the man who basically raised him to at least witness his son’s last moments.

No matter how terrified he is. No matter how much he hates being here, no matter how much worse it’s going to be to see his Captain’s son on an execution platform.

(Aviva had been the one to choose Loguetown’s execution’s square as the location for their attack on Strawhat. Buggy had only been there because the anniversary had been approaching and he had wanted to give his respects, no matter how much he resented the man for abandoning them and giving himself up.)

He can do this, Buggy thinks. He can be a witness, maybe trip someone discreetly if necessary, and then leave without anyone seeing him.

 

* * *

 

And then a giant wave heaves them up, but freezes before hitting the water again, and they’re stuck on top of the ice. Then Strawhat does something stupid _again_ and suddenly they’re flying and then falling right into the bay. Buggy barely has the time to register some vaguely familiar haki signatures ( _but no that is not possible why would they be here_ ) before he hits the water and starts sinking. Thankfully, Jinbei is quick to gather all the anchors (and there’s a lot of them too, what with Strawhat, Ivankov and his second, Crocodile and Mr 3) and bring them up to the surface, where they gather on a piece of ballast.

And that’s when he sees it.

The Oro Jackson, floating between the Whitebeard Allied Fleet and the Moby Dick itself. And scattered on the plaza and on the ice, their fights momentarily interrupted while everyone stares at the new arrivals, are people he hasn’t seen since his captain was executed.

 

* * *

 

He doesn’t even needs his eyes to find them, his Observation haki locking on them as easy as breathing (because it’s always been easier to escape a situation if he knows exactly who and where the people around him are, Observation Haki had been the first thing he had unlocked and he had always found it much easier than Armament. Because one needs to be in battle to use Armament and Buggy would rather avoid that altogether).

There’s Silver Rayleigh, locked in a duel with Sengoku himself. There’s Scopper and Rush, protecting their ship from a furious Akainu. There’s Riza, up in the crow’s nest, felling soldiers left and right. There’s Gulliver, supporting Whitebeard’s own giant commander. There’s Marian, knifing whoever is stupid enough to get near her, and there’s Elena fighting against Aokiji alongside one of Whitebeard’s commanders and a woman he only vaguely recognises, until she punches a crater in the ground and he flinches at the memory of a medic on the Black Maria (and then wants to slap himself for not realising the obvious. How the hell had Captain managed to score with Blackjack D. Rouge?). Yadomaru is there too, playing whack-a-mole with Monkey D. Garp, and Seagull is keeping Shichibukai Moria busy. Crocus, the old fart who looks exactly the same save for the grey in his hair, is standing across Vice-Admiral Tsuru.

He’s staring at Buggy.

 

* * *

 

Buggy inhales.

Crocus never leaves his lighthouse. Rayleigh rarely leaves Sabaody. He hasn’t heard from any of them in over twenty years, but he knows, from the information Shanks shares with him, that none of them stayed in the same place. There hasn’t been more than two of them on the same island in over two decades.

And yet here they are, all gathered together, and that means that this is _planned_ . That they _knew_ Captain had had a son and that that son was scheduled for execution.

_All of them had known._

And none of them had told him. None of them had thought that maybe he deserved to know that his captain had left a legacy. Not a single one of them.

And that. That _hurts_.

But not as much as their surprise does.

Because it’s his presence they’re surprised by. Not the prisoner’s uniform he’s still wearing.

Which means that they’d known he was in Impel Down.

They had gathered here ready to fight for a boy most of them had probably never met before. But none of them had cared that he had been thrown in Impel down and left there to rot.

 

* * *

 

The thing is, Buggy can’t even bring himself to be surprised. Not anymore. Not after the past twenty years where only Shanks had tried to stay in touch.

(And Buggy will never ever admit it, but he is grateful, so grateful that the redhead hadn’t abandoned him, hadn’t left him behind like all the others did. Because Buggy doesn’t think he would have made it, if Shanks hadn’t stuck with him these first two years after Captain’s execution, barely fifteen to Buggy’s fourteen. He still doesn’t know how he managed to survive the following three years on his own, after they got separated in the Hell that they call the New World. By the time they found each other again, Shanks had already assembled the beginning of his crew and Buggy had still been on his own.)

(Shanks had offered him a place on his crew, as his second even, and Buggy had refused. Because Shanks and his crew were going to be monsters, and Buggy had long since learned that his place would never be amongst them.)

Buggy had been fourteen when he had lost the closest thing he’d ever had to a father, when the crew who had stuck together for the two years before that, even without their captain, had disbanded for good and left the two apprentices to rot. None of them had looked back. None of them had tried to keep an eye on the two youngest. It was as if they had forgotten about them.

Well, Buggy could testify that his Captain’s enemies hadn’t, for all that Roger had done his best to keep his apprentices out of the limelight.

(Buggy still doesn’t know how he survived these three years. He does know that he wouldn’t have if he hadn’t had his devil fruit. Some days, he doesn’t know of it is a blessing or a curse.)

Shanks has been in touch with them, he knows that much. The redhead came across Rayleigh during these three years and got some additional training, and a few of the others have sought him out since.

No one had tried to contact Buggy in twenty years. And it isn’t like Buggy had been hard to find. He’d stayed in East Blue, had made a small name for himself, had earned a few bounties. It had been child’s play to find him, as his red-haired friend had proved multiple times. They could even have asked Shanks about him.

They never did. Shanks had offered to tell them about him, but Buggy had declined, refusing to beg for attention and care that should have been freely offered. Shanks had nodded and never mentioned it again.

(Baterilla is not the only reason the red head hasn’t been sober in twenty years. Buggy will never ask, but he knows. Shanks might have accidentally stumbled upon Rayleigh after they got separated, but he had been on his own until then. And none of it had been pleasant. He knows just as well as Buggy does that none of the others even tried looking for them.)

 

* * *

 

He tears his eyes away from ~~_his_ _former_ _home_~~ the Oro Jackson, says something witty and tries to find somewhere to look at that is not any of the Roger Kaizoku.

They reformed to rescue a young man they had never met, who already had his own crew of monsters ready to save him, but not one of them could be bothered to spare a thought for a teenage pirate who had sailed with them for four years and who had been horrendously out of his depth.

 

* * *

 

He exhales.

At least it’s nice to know for sure where he stands with them.

He doesn’t let his eyes stray on any of the Roger Kaizoku, instead spits out something vaguely witty and watches as Crocodile makes a go for Whitebeard’s head, only to be stopped by Mugiwara.

Information is the mother of survival, and Buggy lets one of his ears fly closer to the Moby Dick.

“We had an agreement did we not? Why do you defend Whitebeard?” The former Shichibukai raged at the rubber idiot.

Said idiot looked up at Whitebeard.

“So this guy really is Whitebeard, huh? Then you're not touching him! This is the one guy Ace really cares about!”

Buggy wants to facepalm. Has the brat never read a single bounty except his own, not to recognize the King of the Oceans?

“Boy... that straw hat you wear... It bears a strong resemblance to the hat Red Hair once wore…” Edward Newgate mentions, and Buggy holds back a snort.

That fucking hat. Shanks had gotten it from Roger after he disbanded the crew, along with a pat on the back and a cheerful smile and no answer to his begged pleas to stay. He had worn it as a reminder of their captain, Buggy knows, but also as a reminder of what not to do, of his promise to never ever take children or teenagers in his crew unless he had absolutely no other choice, and unless he could guarantee that he wouldn’t leave them behind before they were ready to face the seas on their own. Leaving it with the youngest Monkey to annoy the oceans had been something he had thought long and hard on, something he had even called Buggy to discuss, because of the conflicting feelings they both held towards that piece of headwear. In the end, Shanks had given it to the boy both as an acknowledgement of potential, and as an incentive to become strong enough to survive the hell that was a pirate’s daily lot in life.

“Oh, hey! You know Shanks, huh? I'm borrowing this hat from him.” Strawhat brightens, tugging on the brim.

“Are you here to save your brother?”

“That's right!”

“I hope you understand who you're up against. You will simply be throwing your life away!”

“Shut up! It's not your job to decide that! I've heard about you... you want to be the pirate king, right? Well the one who's going to be the pirate king is me!”

_Fucking Ds._

“Well I'll be damned... Seems like Old Roger’s Ghost isn’t going to leave me alone today…” Whitebeard mutters. “First that lot on the Oro Jackson, then you… You'd better not get in my way, Greenhorn!”

“I'll do this however I damn well want! I'm saving Ace myself!”

Buggy gives up. He doesn’t understand how Ds work, and he doesn’t even want to try to anymore. The boy hasn’t even recognized the Oro Jackson for Davy Jones’ sake!

Buggy’s comrades of misfortune, however, have.

“Is that…” Jimbei stares in shock.

“My my my “ Ivankov twirls around. “Those are some very familiar faces here!”

The pirates who have unilaterally decided that he is their new captain are harassing him with questions as they too have recognised the Jolly Roger floating high above the ship. Buggy ignores them, throwing an angry glare when they insist, somehow managing to cow them into silence even though most of them have higher bounties than he does. Instead, he focuses on the conversation between the Yonkou and Shanks’ protege.

“Ace's execution is to be moved up? You're sure that is what they said?”

“They mentioned getting something ready, but it was all in code so I don't know what they were talking about. We both want to save Ace, so I should tell you that at least!”

“I see. That is important information indeed. I'm sorry.”

“No problems! I'm coming Ace!” The younger one yells as he throws himself into the battle.

“I guess schedules don't apply when it comes to pirates. The question is, what exactly are they getting ready?” Whitebeard muses, studying his counterpart on the Marine’s side intently.

The phoenix lands next to him, retaking his human form.

“Boss! The marines received orders to proceed with Ace's execution ahead of schedule!”

“Yeah, I know. Just remain calm. Their plan is to make us panic. There's no way they would be so careless and let us overhear their plans. He is just that kind of man!”

As if Buggy needed a reminder that Sengoku is _also_ a monster.

Fuck his life.

He vaguely registers the Strawhat getting in a verbal fight with his brother while also physically fighting off multiple marines, too focused on Whitebeard. He does hear Sengoku loudly proclaiming the boy’s parentage for all to hear, and notices Fire-Fist finally calming down, resigned, ready for whatever fate is left in store for him, acknowledging his fleet’s effort in trying to save him.

Then he hears Whitebeard’s quiet voice directed at _him_ (well, at his ear at the very least), and he freezes.

 

* * *

 

“Well well... if it isn't one of Roger's brats. It's been a while. I see you're still alive. Why did you bring all those convicts? Are you after my head, Red-Nose? Or here to join your fellows in interfering with my affairs?”

The voice is quiet, deliberately pitched so that only Buggy’s dropped ear can catch it, but the tone is deceptively light.

(And fuck, why is it that Whitebeard can remember that Buggy used to sail on the Oro Jackson, but his own fucking crew can’t? How fucking unfair is that?)

Buggy takes a breath, makes sure no one can see him, and then sends his mouth to join his ear.

“Don’t call me that, Whitebeard.”

The man raises an eyebrow, too perceptive for Buggy’s own fucking good.

“Roger’s brat? Or Red-Nose?”

“Either. Both. Take you fucking pick.” Buggy snorts. Adrenaline is running through his veins, but Newgate has always been _fair_ , has never deliberately attacked anyone that wasn’t asking for it, and always had a sweet spot for loud mouthed idiots. “And to answer your question, neither. I didn’t even know Roger had had a kid until I landed here. Call it collateral damage from that moron with the Strawhat deciding to infiltrate Impel Down to try and get his brother back before the execution - I know better than to get myself involved in a situation I’m so fucking outclassed in.”

“You didn’t know?”

“Does it _look_ like any of them bothered to call me?” Buggy spits out, more bitter than he intended to let show.

But Whitebeard has always been able to make him spill more than he intended to, hasn’t he? Even back when he had been a cabin brat on the Oro Jackson, the man had had the uncanny ability to get Buggy to rant about whatever was bothering him whenever their two crew met up semi-peacefully to drink a lot and spar semi-amicably. No wonder the man had gathered over a thousand ‘children’ -  he had the parenting voice down to a T from the get go.

And Buggy doesn’t even _like_ the man!

“Anyway, I’m off to find somewhere out of the way until I can get my ass of this clusterfuck. Good luck getting Hiken back. Have fun messing with everyone.”

And without giving Whitebeard a chance to reply, Buggy recalls his appendages and proceeds to make good on his statement.

Crocus’s eyes remain fixed on him until Tsuru forces him to pay attention to her. Buggy deliberately ignores him.

They’ve been doing the same thing to him for years, after all.

Instead, he goes and finds the one Denden who hasn’t been frozen by Aokiji (probably as soon as they identified the Oro Jackson, they wouldn’t want the rest of the world finding out that the Roger Kaizoku were not as dead and gone as they had been pretending for two decades) and sets out to record and transmit the entire battle. No matter what happens today, he will make sure that no one will be able to brush it under the carpet, not unless they’re willing to murder every single person who has gathered in front of the giants screens that the marines themselves put on every island under their control.

Unless they’re willing to have another blank century, the Marines will have to deal with the consequences of this war, not matter how it ends.

Buggy has never been more than an inconvenience in the Marine’s eyes before today. He doesn’t want to rise to a threat level, doesn’t want to put his crew through that, and he’ll do his best to stay out of the camera’s range, and he won’t fight unless it’s to protect himself, but he will be a witness and he will testify, exposing the lies being paraded as the truth. He’s not doing it for the kid, who even now is trying to renounce all relations to Roger, claiming loud and clear that Whitebeard is the only father he knows. He’s not doing it for Whitebeard either, for all that he respects the man even if he will never understand him and will always consider him a monster level with Roger (at least Whitebeard will never abandon a nakama, will go to war to get them back, and Buggy is not jealous, he’s _not_ ). He’s not doing it for his Captain either (because he left, he abandoned them, Ace and Rouge and Buggy and the Roger Kaizoku equally) and certainly not for the crew who has made it clear that he is no longer one of them.

Buggy takes the Denden and holds it high, records the battle that will mark the end of an era and the start of a new one, and he does it _for himself_.

Buggy the Clown used to be a Roger Kaizoku. That still means something, even if only to him.


	4. Ja, wir sind Piraten und fahren zu Meere/wir fürchten nicht Tod und den Teufel dazu/ wir lachen der Feinde und aller Gefahren/am Grunde des Meeres erst finden wir Ruh

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How long have they waited to unleash their grief upon the marines who took their captain from them?
> 
> Too long, no doubt, is the answer he reads in their bloodthirsty smiles.
> 
> Crocus twirls his harpoons in front of him, well aware that his face is sporting the same. He is a doctor, always has been, always will be, and he dislikes killing if he can avoid it.
> 
> But he is also a Roger Kaizoku, whom many have called monsters, and today his blood is roaring in his ears and singing for battle.
> 
> But today the world won't let him be a doctor, won't let him stop and heal and fix people, and Crocus is a doctor, always has been, always will be, and he will not kill any of the rank and files marines if he doesn’t have to, but he can’t be a doctor today so he gets to be a monster Roger Kaizoku instead and his smile is wide as he charges alongside his comrades.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A Crocus Chapter! This one fought me all the way, so let me know what you think because I'm not entirely satisfied by it.
> 
> Crocus is getting pretty pissed about people doing medically dubious or counterindicated things and overall not listening to the qualified medics, and he's this close to being done with all these morons. Thankfully, he gets to vent on some idiot marines instead.
> 
> I'm also trying to show the difference in how Crocus views things compared to Buggy, hope I did a decent job of it!
> 
> Chapter title is from a German sea shanty called "Wir lieben die Stürme" ("We love the storms"):
> 
> I will also be going back and editing chapter titles with extracts from various shanties now that I've finally decided on what to do with them.

> Ja, wir sind Piraten und fahren zu Meere, (Yes, we are pirates and sail the seas)  
> wir fürchten nicht Tod und den Teufel dazu, (We fear neither death nor the devil himself,)  
> wir lachen der Feinde und aller Gefahren, (We laugh at our enemies and at all danger,)  
> am Grunde des Meeres erst finden wir Ruh. (Only at the bottom of the sea will we find peace.)
> 
> (Wir lieben die Stürme)
> 
> * * *
> 
>  

Crocus loses sight of Buggy when his own fight starts again, Tsuru taking offence to him ignoring her in favour of the Oro Jackson’s former cabin boy. By the time he can afford to take a look around, the man is nowhere to be found and he has to repress a swear. Great. If the brat has decided to hide, finding him is going to be a pain in the ass. He had taken to Observation Haki like a duck to water, and had always been scarily good at hiding his own voice when he wanted to disappear.

And while part of him understands very well why someone might want to hide after being literally thrown into the mess that is this battlefield, the rest of him is trying to figure out why there had been no reaction regarding the rest of them.

Buggy has always been impulsive, prone to speak without talking, quick to anger and _loud_ . Crocus hadn’t expected Buggy to suddenly appear in the middle of Marineford, but once he had seen him he had expected an outburst, one of these tantrums he used to throw when something surprised him or annoyed him, _something_.

Instead, Buggy hadn’t spared them a single glance. He had stared at the Oro Jackson in shock, then had pointedly looked anywhere but at it, getting in a argument with the younger Monkey and then disappearing as soon as Crocus looked away.

The doctor doesn’t like the implications behind that. He doesn’t like it at all, and his resolve to catch the clown before leaving doubles.

Hopefully, Shanks would get here soon. Something tells him he’s going to need all the help he can get if he wants to catch the youngest member of their crew.

* * *

He keeps an eye on Shanks’ protegee even as he focuses on his own fight, but thankfully it looks like the Revolutionary is keeping an eye on _that_ D, even if it means getting between Kizaru and his prey. A medical professional the man is by no mean, but he’s a decent fighter even if a very disturbing one.

Not as disturbing as the Shichibukai, Moria, though. Zombies? Controlled by their shadows?

No. Crocus doesn’t even want to know. Fucking devil fruits making a mockery of the laws of Nature.

* * *

 

Meanwhile, Ace is still trying to dissuade his brother from trying to save him. _Moron_ , Crocus snorts inwardly. He’s a D, and he raised the boy himself from what Crocus had been able to find out, he should bloody well know by now that there was no changing a D’s mind once it’s made up.

“Stay away, Luffy! You should know better! We are both pirates! We have both sailed the seas! I have my own adventures! I have my own nakama! You shouldn't but in! You're such a weakling! You think I'll forgive someone like you for rescuing me? This is humiliating! Go home, Luffy! Why did you come?!”

“I am your little brother! I don't care about the rules of pirates!” Said other D replies with a glare for his older brother.

For all that Ace is Roger’s son, Crocus is once again hit by how much Luffy resembles his former captain in that moment. It’s not just the Straw Hat and the dark hair, though that doesn’t help either, it’s the posture. The attitude. The implications that nothing and no one will stop him from doing what he has decided to do, from protecting what is precious to him. It’s bittersweet, painful with a dash of wry anticipation. Monkey D Luffy isn’t Gol D Roger, not even close, but… One day, he could be just as great. Ace will never take his father's crown, has no interest in  it for himself. He might try and get it for Newgate, but the man has no particular desire for the title either, his ambition satisfied with being 'father’ to that ridiculously huge crew of his. Luffy, though… the Strawhat has potential, and something tells him that the younger man is going to take the New World by the storm if given half a chance.

Crocus is looking forwards to that.

“You don't get it…” Ace yells back, a sound nearly drowned by the wave Jimbei uses to blast the zombies away, coincidentally cutting their link to Moria because of… salt?

Nope, still doesn’t want to know. Devil fruit users are to normal people what the New World is to East Blue, and he’ll only give himself a headache trying to apply logic to them. The fact that Moria claims to be a scientist as well is mind boggling _and Crocus really really wants to research Devil fruits users in-depth to know how to treat them when they defy the laws of anatomy_. He just knows better than to actually attempt it, and tends to stick with the true and tried “cuff them with seastone before you bring out the needles” method.

“What are you doing, allowing a rookie to beat you up?!” Sengoku roars in anger, having managed to escape his duel with Rayleigh while the man was busy with other vice-admirals. “This man is another danger for the future! He isn't only raised together with Ace, but... he is also the son of ‘Revolutionary Dragon’!”

Crocus snorts as he watches the marines run around like panicked chickens. Really. What do they even know about Dragon? The man is so bloody secretive even Shakky only knows for sure what he is even doing most of the time, and she isn’t sharing.

“You should be more worried about the dangers from the past who are here to kick your ass!” Yadomaru yells, punting Garp towards the strategist. “Rather than rookies who aren’t even old enough to shave!”

There goes the BlackJack captain, stealing words from his mouth. Ah well. Ladies first and all that (not that he’s ever going to say that in her face, he likes being alive thank you very much).

Garp manages to catch himself with difficulty, but it is obvious that he has taken quite the beating. Crocus would be rather enjoying the sight if he wasn’t busy fighting for his life. A shame, really. Hopefully, someone is recording this mess. Something tells him that he’ll want to rewatch it at some point, if only to understand what happened when everything inevitably goes to shit.

(He’s being realistic, not pessimistic. Everything is going too smoothly and Murphy doesn’t give a shit that pirates fall under Davy Jones’ domain when it comes to fucking shit up. Especially when there’s a D involved, and right now there’s at least three of those on the island. There’s tempting Fate and then there’s ringing her doorbell, mooning her when she opens the door and running away while ruining her flowerbeds.)

“I don't care, there is no need to hide it anymore. Luffy has already gained such power and infamy that such labels may as well mean nothing!” The marine hero yells out.

Crocus would beg to differ, but it’s not like anyone ever listens to a medic when a D is concerned, is it? Yeah, the kid has potential, that’s why Shanks took an interest in the brat in the first place, but he’s also seventeen and hasn’t even attempted to cross to the New World yet.

Rayleigh had told him all about the fight with the Pacifistas and Kuma, about how the kid’s nakama have been flung around the Grand Line to places unknown. Hell, the kid doesn’t even look like he knows what Haki is! Shows how shitty of a trainer Garp is, that his own grandson doesn’t even know the basics of Observation or Armament!

Sure, he had become infamous in his own right, but at least he had only had to contend with the consequences of his own bullheaded actions! And yes, the Ennies Lobby thing had been huge, but now people would be trying to get at him to get at Dragon, and that would not end up well for the kid. Dragon has always been an ambitious asshole, and has pissed off quite a lot of influential figures for someone who tries his best to pretend he doesn't exist. People on both sides would be gunning for the brat, and Crocus is not looking forward to that mess.

Especially given that Dragon had handed him over to Garp in the first place, despite despising the man and cutting all ties with him. Odds were, if it came down to his son or his Revolution, Dragon wouldn’t even hesitate. Asshole.

Ah damn it, now Crocus wants to kick Dragon’s ass too. He already has a mental list of grievances ready to justify it, too, starting with leaving a kid with Garp ( _despite having experienced the man’s sorry excuse for parenting first hand)_ followed by allowing Ivankov to stab random people with unstable hormones cocktails and calling it medicine. Not to mention the forced sex changes. That technique has so much potential for people who desperately need medical intervention for their body to reflect their actual gender, and Ivankov’s cavalier attitude infuriates Crocus to the highest degree, especially given how badly that attitude is impacting the image of the transgender community in particular (and the Queer community as a whole, let’s be honest here). The okama Emperor is just handing the more close minded assholes heaps of material and Crocus can’t stand it anymore. He had been _glad_ when news had reached him that Ivankov had  gotten himself thrown in Impel Down for Davy Jones’ sake! Of course that was apparently just one of Dragon’s ploys, but _still._

“Ace! I don't care what you say! I'm going to save you even if it kills me!”

Yeah, and at this rate it might just kill him, too! The doctor in Crocus is screaming to send the moron off the battlefield and to a proper hospital were he could start fixing up the mess that Ivankov’s hormones have done to his body, but _no one ever listens to medical professionals when it comes to Ds, do they?_

* * *

He takes his frustration out on some random grunts, as Tsuru has finally given up on him and is currently laundering some lower grade Whitebeard Pirates trying to get past her and to their second commander.

“Marco... I won't forgive you if you let that boy die!” Said captain proclaims for all to hear.

Of fucking course. Great. The boy has impressed Whitebeard now. Shanks is _never_ going to shut up about this, Crocus bemoans inwardly, his protegee earning Whitebeard’s respect before he even made it to the New World will have the redhead crowing about it for _months_ . That’s two Yonkou down on his side, at least for now (though why they decided to give his former cabin-boy that title is still beyond him, especially given that the man spends every waking hour drunk or drinking, interspersed with the occasional flirting and, apparently, deciding to tweak Monkey D Garp’s nose by becoming his grandson’s hero and inspiring him to become a pirate, just, _why?)_ and that is _huge_ , especially for a rookie like this, even for a D.

The last one to get that respect had been the very man they’re here to save from the axe, Portgas D. Ace. Though, really, he only had to mention being Luffy’s brother for Shanks to like him, and Whitebeard liked his spunk enough to basically kidnap him even when the guy had been trying to kill him constantly, so is it really that high of an honour?

* * *

Crocus shakes himself out of his random musings in time to catch an incoming sword with one of his harpoon, sending its owner flying into another marine. He really should stop allowing himself to get lost in thoughts in the middle of battle, he thinks, but it’s been so long with only Laboon for regular company that he just got in the habit, and it’s going to be a pain to shake.

At least Ace looks to be calming down. He’s not yelling anymore, and though Crocus is too far away to hear what he’s saying to Garp, he’s sitting up straight now, head held high as he overlooks the War that is being fought in his name. His entire posture radiates calm acceptance of whatever happens next, and in that moment he reminds him of Rouge more than he ever has Roger.

Stupid Ds. Crocus misses that menace. Sure, he’d questioned her taste in men because she had been so far out his captain’s league it was _hilarious_ , but the woman had been one heck of a pirate. She would probably have beaten them to Raftel if she had been the slightest bit interested in getting there in the first place, but she had always enjoyed making fools of the Marines and of the World Government more. Yadomaru had told him once about the debates her captain used to get into with Dragon, back when his Revolution was still in the infant stages. The bickering would go on for _hours_ apparently.

Shaking himself out of his nostalgia again, he focuses back on the present and makes sure to stick close to the Strawhat. Professional deformation -  the boy is a patient waiting to collapse, Crocus just wants to put him on a stretcher already. That, and Shanks would never shut up if something happened to the brat under his watch. Though, really, if the Red-head liked the kid that much, he should just have taken him on the Red Force to start with, keep him where he could keep an eye on him himself. Oh well. Too late for what-ifs now.

* * *

 

At least he doesn’t need to interfere in the boy’s battles - but _Boa Hancock?_ Shichibukai Boa Hancock, from the man-hating island of Amazon Lily? How the _hell_ had the kid managed to get her as an ally?

(Is she _swooning_ at him? No. Nope. Crocus doesn’t want to know.)

(Lucky bastard.)

* * *

To the side, Ivankov is desperately trying to reason with Kuma, to no avail. The bribes of conversation that reach Crocus’ (the Okama Empress has no notion of volume control) seem to indicate that the Shichibukai has had his entire memory erased, as well as everything that made him a person in the first place. Ouch. That does not sound pleasant, and Crocus’ medical curiosity really, really wants to know more about it, itches to know how to _fix it_ , but Mihawk is rushing for the brat and the doctor knows where his priorities should be.

It’s so _frustrating,_ though, because today keeps throwing things at him that make him twitch for his instruments and not being able to do anything about any of it _pisses him off_.

Thankfully, the insanely lucky brat appears to awaken his observation haki just in time to avoid getting sliced to pieces by the best swordsman in the world long enough for Whitebeard’s fifth commander, Floral Blade Vista, to interfere.

Then the Pacifistas arrive and Crocus wants to swear. He gives in and really does colour the air blue when he hears Sengoku’s yell.

“At the same time as Ace's execution, wipe them all out at once!”

Ha! As if he even could!

A quick glance backwards is enough to tell him that the Pacifistas won’t be a problem much longer, not when Gulliver and Little Oars seem to have make it a challenge to see who could get the most of them. On the battlefield, Whitebeard’s commanders rush out to create an opening towards Ace.

A look at the Moby Dick shows their captain in conversation with a man Crocus can vaguely recognise, but whose name escapes him. Then again, given how freaking _big_ Whitebeard’s crew is, that’s really no wonder.

Then the world turns upside down and Crocus has to blink twice to make sure his eyes aren’t deceiving him.

* * *

Whitebeard, Edward Newgate, he who treats all his nakamas as his own children, has just been stabbed through the chest by one of his own.

* * *

 

It’s only Marco’s enraged cry that tells him that what he just saw is real as the Phoenix rushes towards the man and slams him into the ground.

Everyone has stopped, everyone is staring, gaping, at what is happening on the Moby Dick.

“Shut up!” The aggressor screams, loud enough to be heard by everyone  involved in this war. “It's your fault this had to happen! Stop this stupidity Whitebeard! I have talked to the marines! I know that they promised to spare the lives of you, your crew and even Ace!”

Crocus raises an eyebrow, disbelief clear on his face. _What the hell?_

As if Newgate is even remotely capable of that! But the man isn’t done.

“We were tricked! I had not idea that Ace was Gol D. Roger's son!  When you found me, I was all alone! You know the reason, don't you? It was because all my friends, my comrades for so many years, were all killed by Roger! You know how much I hate Roger!”

* * *

 

Ah. Shit. Now Crocus knows why the guy seems so familiar. Vortex Spider Squardo. The lone survivor of one of Shiki’s allied crew that Roger had personally dealt with during the Edd War before the storm had taken care of the rest. They hadn’t been angels, none of them, on either side of that War, but Crocus had never really come across anyone holding that kind of grudge for that long before, Marines excepted. People generally hating their crew in general and Roger in particular for the reputation they had gained, yes, and he has always been quietly grateful that his name never really made it in the papers, nor his bounty, but he’s never been confronted by someone who has personally suffered under their hands.

It’s not a nice feeling.

* * *

 

“So you should have said something!” Squardo is roaring. “You should have told me that Ace was Roger's son, and that you were guiding him to be the next Pirate King! But no! And then you even agreed to work with _them!”_

He gestures angrily at the Oro Jackson.

“That was already a betrayal! What a fool I was for treating Ace like a friend! And then when your precious little Ace was captured... You sold us out! You traded the lives of the 43 captains under you for Ace's life! Your crew and Ace will be spared! You made a deal with Sengoku! It's true, isn't it? And we had no idea! We've been fighting for you and for Ace! Look!”

He points at the destroyed ships behind the Moby Dick.

“Who are the Marines targeting? That's right, us! We are trapped by the ice! We have nowhere to run! It is a miracle you allowed me to get a blow in... but now I am ready! Just kill me!”

Crocus wants to snort, wants to laugh at how ridiculous the whole thing is, because _really?_ How could anyone believe that Edward Newgate, the most noble motherfucking pirate to ever sail this world, one who really should have been born in a different era, the man who has repeatedly stated that his greatest treasure was the family he had built, could ever sell out even one of them?

But he doesn’t, because he can hear the whispers around him, coming from the crews that are allied with the Shirohige Kaizoku.

* * *

 

“No way, it can't be! But come to think of it, we are the only ones being attacked!”

“I didn't want to believe it... I even doubted my own eyes!” Squardo continues.

“You fool! You were tricked! Why didn't you trust the boss!?” The phoenix is furious as he forcibly holds the traitor face down to the ground.

“Don't give me that Marco!”

“It's true that Ace is Roger's son…” Whitebeard states calmly, as if uncaring of the sword planted in his chest that makes Crocus’ fingers itch for his kit. “They manipulated you, knowing how that information would affect you... they are one step ahead of us…”

* * *

 

It’s Crocodile who breaks the silence that follows, spitting on the ground in fury.

“You are pathetic, Whitebeard! You weren't this weak when you defeated me!!”

He has a point, Crocus knows. Whitebeard should have been able to avoid that strike as easily as breathing, especially with his Observation Haki. That he hadn’t… well, that says a lot about his current physical state, doesn’t it?

Crocus manages to catch the eye of the tall and imposing woman standing a few meters behind her captain. Her face is set in stone, her fingers gripping the medical satchel at her side as if she wants nothing more than to rush over and take care of the injury. But the ‘Terrifying Nightingale’ doesn’t. And Crocus’ heart tightens when he realises why.

The old man isn’t planning on coming out of this alive. He just wants to go out in one last fight, one last stand against the Marines and for the family he had painstakingly pieced together.

Fuck.

Fuck this shit. He knows exactly how his counterpart on the Moby Dick must be feeling right now. And it’s a really, really shitty feeling. Fuck their captains for doing this to them.

* * *

 

“Squardo... you dare to raise your sword against your father... my foolish son! But though you may be a fool, I still love you…” Newgate declares, bending down to embrace the man who had just stabbed him, uncaring of the bleeding wound in his chest.

“You must be joking! You sold us out!”

“Who was it? Who turned the heart of one as loyal as yourself into the darkness?” Whitebeard demands, and yes, Crocus wants to know too, because this is fucking beyond the pale. Trying to turn Newgate’s children against him? That is a _low_ blow, and one he had thought Sengoku to be above.

But the end justifies the means, eh? Anything to get rid of the Pirate King’s legacy, no matter how shameful the action. And if you could get rid of one of the Yonkou at the same time, all the better!

Fucking Sengoku. And to think Roger had respected the man, once, had respected his intellect and his strategies and the way he genuinely cared about his men. Becoming Fleet Admiral has ruined him, and Crocus _hates it_. Hates what is happening to all the bright lights of his generation, how they are all going out one by one, either snuffed out by the ravage of time or enemy action, or dimmed until unrecognisable by the corruption eating them alive.

* * *

 

“It was one of the marines, a member of a rebel faction! He said if I killed you my crew would be spared!” The poor man doesn’t look like he knows what to believe in anymore. Sucks to be him, but Crocus is not exactly feeling compassionate right now.

“So it was Akainu, was it? I know how much you hate Roger... I'm painfully aware of it. But Squad, it's ridiculous to hold children accountable for the sins of their fathers... what has Ace done to you? Be friends with him... Ace is not the only special one... you are all... my family. You really think I would sell out my children?”

Roaring, Newgate breaks the ice that was blocking them in, giving the pirates an escape route, and Crocus inhales sharply.

Dying and bleeding out the man might be, but he even so he remains the strongest man on the Oceans for a reason. It’s exhilarating, seeing him there, bending the world to his whims even as he straightens himself to stand proudly in front of his men, in front of the man who betrayed him and whom he has already forgiven.

“If you call yourself pirates!” Whitebeard roars out, his voice heard by even the most distant ships. “Then choose for yourself what to believe! Those who would follow me... be ready to lose your lives! Come with me!”

* * *

 

Crocus trades glances with the rest of his crew. Well, they _had_ come here for a good fight, and despite his current condition, Newgate is clearly itching for one as well. How long has it been, Crocus muses as he grips his harpoons tighter, since this world has truly seen that man fight? Too long, probably, since they had dared to try and pull that shit on one of Whitebeard’s own.

How long has it been since any of them were able to let loose? He can see Scopper Gaban leaving Rush and Riza to guard the Oro Jackson as he runs to join the charge, axe at the ready, Marian and Elena standing back to back with Haruta and Yadomaru, Seagull rushing forward alongside Diamond Jozu, Gulliver fighting side by side with Little Oars, Rayleigh keeping Kizaru busy.

How long have they waited to unleash their grief upon the marines who took their captain from them?

Too long, no doubt, is the answer he reads in their bloodthirsty smiles.

Crocus twirls his harpoons in front of him, well aware that his face is sporting the same. He is a doctor, always has been, always will be, and he dislikes killing if he can avoid it.

But he is also a Roger Kaizoku, whom many have called monsters, and today his blood is roaring in his ears and singing for battle.

But today the world won't him be a doctor, won't him stop and heal and _fix_ people, and Crocus is a doctor, always has been, always will be, and he will not kill any of the rank and files marines if he doesn’t have to, but he can’t be a doctor today so he gets to be a ~~monster~~ Roger Kaizoku instead and his smile is wide as he charges alongside his comrades.

 


	5. Loguivy de la mer, Loguivy de la mer / Tu regardes mourir les derniers vrais marins / Loguivy de la mer, au fond de ton vieux port / S'entassent les carcasses des bateaux déjà morts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Whitebeard, the last great captain of the Pirate King’s era, is dying.
> 
> And this is how he wants to go out: fighting alongside the pirates he calls his children to save a son who will always be his more than his rival.
> 
> Buggy thinks it’s stupid.
> 
> Buggy thinks it’s brave.
> 
> But mostly, he thinks it’s right . It’s right for the kind of man Edward Newgate always has been, the man for whom the greatest treasure has always been his family of choice rather all the gold of the world. It’s right for him to die protecting them, surrounding them, even if it will also hurt them more than anything else the world could throw at them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back with more bitter!Buggy !
> 
> And I've become even more bitter on Buggy's behalf because it turns out I didn't actually make Buggy and Shanks younger than in canon!
> 
> Shanks and Buggy were TEN YEARS OLD when the Edd War happened. Buggy got his Devil Fruit and lost his ability to swim, something that had apparently been his speciality and a huge part of his life on the Oro Jackson, before he hit the double digits and nearly drowned immediately after eating it!
> 
> Buggy and Shanks were TWELVE when the Roger Kaizoku reached Raftel! They were FOURTEEN at most when Roger was executed!
> 
> No wonder they're so fucked up, god these kids probably killed someone before reaching the double digits. Shanks was drinking before he was TEN, for Davy Jones' sake! This explains SO MUCH about Buggy's character and I'm even more pissed off at the rest of the Roger Kaizoku (turns out my estimate for the crew is rather low, there appear to be at least a dozen unnamed pirate on the Oro Jackson in the One Piece: Strong World Chapter 0 of the manga) for leaving these kids on their own after that mess! Geez no wonder Shanks did not want to take Luffy on the Red Force, he knows perfectly well how that fucks a child up!
> 
> Ahem.
> 
> Sorry. I found that out while researching the Edd War for this chapter and I'm still angry.
> 
> Oh by the way Buggy's memory of the Edd War? Taken nearly word for word from Strong World. Yeah. That did happen like that. Again, no fucking wonder Buggy became the man we see in the manga with that kind of trauma behind him. On the plus side, this nicely confirms my take on his character, but holy fuck.
> 
> Anyway. Here's the chapter, sorry it took a while but I'm currently working on my dissertation novel for my Creative Writing MA (but needed a distraction because writer's block on that, hence this chapter coming out now instead of, say, September). It's longer than the others, too, because Buggy has a lot to say. Hope you like it, please let me know what you think!
> 
> Chapter title is from French sea shanty "Loguivy de la mer"
> 
> PS: Changing the fic title to "Watashitachi wa Roger kaizoku desu" because Haru D Nae has kindly pointed out that my previous one was a bad google translate! Thank you for letting me know :)

 

 

> Loguivy de la mer, Loguivy de la mer  
>  _(Loguivy of the sea, Loguivy of the sea)_  
>  Tu regardes mourir les derniers vrais marins  
>  ( _You're watching the last true sailors die)_  
>  Loguivy de la mer, au fond de ton vieux port  
>  ( _Loguivy of the sea, at the bottom of your old port)_  
>  S'entassent les carcasses des bateaux déjà morts  
>  ( _are piling up the carcasses of ships already dead)_
> 
> _( **Loguivy de la mer)**_

 

* * *

 

 

The marines are being even stupider than usual, Buggy thinks. Making a spectacle of this had been a mistake in the first place. If they had wanted to ensure Firefist’s death (C _aptain’s son Captain’s son Captain’s son)_ they should have executed him in secret and revealed the entire thing afterwards. This is a production, a show put on to prove their superiority after getting their ass kicked by the Strawhat. The destruction of Ennies Lobby in particular had been hard to explain, and so they had been in a desperate need of a publicity stunt to regain the trust of the general population of sheep.

It was always going to backfire, what with basically declaring war on Whitebeard and passing the sins of the father down on the child, but this? This is one massive clusterfuck and Buggy doesn’t want to be in Sengoku’s shoes when the old Buddha explains it to the higher ups after this. The odds of him keeping his post if the brat dies are extremely low. If the brat survives, that won’t even be a question.

All of this is rubbing him the wrong way. This entire situation. Teach capturing Firefist in the first place. The announcement in the newspaper that Strawhat had mentioned. This fucking production. Blackbeard _not showing up_ , despite his shiny new Shichibukai title. _The Roger Kaizoku showing up_. This whole thing is a fucking mess, and Buggy wants no part in it, but it looks like he won’t have a choice.

Story of his life, isn’t it?

Odds are, someone is going to call for an immediate execution of Firefist soon, instead of waiting another three hours. And that! Why the hell would you bring the prisoner out four hours early? Some Marine tradition or protocol apparently, but _really._ That is just _begging_ for someone to come and rescue him.

The whole thing just reeks of _trap,_ one quite obviously meant for Whitebeard and his men - and maybe the Strawhats too, if the marines had known of their bond beforehand.

(But not for the Roger Kaizoku, because no one expected them, no one thought they would show up for Firefist ~~when they didn’t for Buggy~~ )

Sengoku is a genius strategist, anyone who’s anyone on the sea knows it. There is no way he would have set this up this way if he doesn’t have something up his sleeve. And there’s no way he’s not already thinking about how to use the sudden appearance of the Roger Kaizoku to his advantage, either.

 

* * *

 

Buggy keeps his eyes on the battlefield, mentally tracking the position of his former nakamas before he can stop himself.

Most of them are still busy with their own opponents, as are the Blackjacks (who are still just as terrifying as he remembered them, and he could have gone another lifetime without meeting them again), but Roban is apparently sticking to the water, close to the ship, though that’s not stopping him from sending the occasional burst of water out to hinder the marine Devil Fruit users, and there’s one signature that’s sticking close to the Strawhat - Crocus.

Well, given that the Okama Empress had done something that probably shouldn’t be called medicine to the brat, the medic is probably making sure the kid doesn’t die on his watch. ~~First time for everything~~

Good, that means Buggy doesn’t have to bother.

(Because the damn Monkey is Shanks’ protege, and Buggy may not care for the kid but he cares for Shanks.)

(He never wants to see him like _that_ anymore.)

(Even if it means putting up with the brat.)

 

* * *

 

(Part of him is angry, is hurt, because why does Crocus care about a kid he probably only met briefly when he crossed the capes, when he couldn’t be bothered to give a damn about Buggy?)

(He crushes that part of him without hesitation. They don’t care, so he will not.)

 

* * *

 

No one has come to bother him, his hiding place still secure and his haki signature completely contained. Being able to do that while still maintaining his observation haki had taken him a few years of hard work, but the benefits have far outweighed the time it took.

His range is a lot wider than it had been when he had been a gangly teenager, too. He can feels the ships further back, around the plaza, and he knows the fight is not going well for them, for all that the pirates seem to be holding their own on the plaza itself. There’s a group of Marine warships coming around from the other side of the island, ready to fall upon them from behind.

The visual denden mushi is still recording, hidden some way away from Buggy so as not to give away his position, but it’s easy enough to literally keep an eye on it, so it’s no trouble.

And that way there’s little chance of anyone identifying who is filming, which is exactly what Buggy wants. He does not want to get involved in this bullshit if he can avoid it, thank you very much.

(He knows Crocus at least wants to talk at him. At and not to, because that’s always how it goes with him, because he’s older and the doctor and so they have to listen to him but he can happily ignore them if they’re not actively bleeding out. Nevermind that Crocus had joined the crew two years after Buggy and Shanks, shortly before the Edd War, had only been with the crew for the last leg of their journey, once the crew had already earned its fearsome reputation, they had always been lowly cabin brats in his eyes.)

(Well fuck him. Fuck him and fuck the rest of the Rogers who had _left them behind_. They didn’t need them, Shanks and him. They had stuck together when they could and then managed to survive somehow when they couldn’t. They had needed the Rogers then, but had quickly learned not to count on them for anything. Everything they are, everything they have become, Shanks and him, they earned it themselves and he won’t let anyone take that away from him, or judge him for not being good enough.)

(He’s good enough for his crew, he’s good enough for Shanks, he’s good enough for himself, for the life he wants for himself and his crew, and that’s all he need.)

(He doesn’t need their approval. Not anymore.)

(So why does it still hurt?)

 

* * *

 

He takes a breath, then another. On the platform, Sengoku has managed to escape Rayleigh temporarily at least, and is loudly proclaiming Strawhat’s parentage for all to hear.

Frankly, Buggy doesn’t quite know what to think about that one.

He had always vaguely known that the Revolutionary was related to Garp in some way, it had been hard not to when Gol D Roger had liked to tease the Marine by asking after the man’s son, but had never really made the link. For damn good reasons, too. Dragon was nothing like his father, be it in appearance or in ideals. The only thing they had in common, really, was that they were both monsters. Buggy dearly hopes the littlest Monkey won’t manage to reproduce, he’s not sure this world can handle four Monkey D’s at once. The Revolutionary's name was weird too, probably one he chose himself when he left his family name behind but Buggy wasn’t a hundred percent sure about that. Even Garp used Dragon, for once, and the Marines weren’t usually shy about blasting someone’s true identity for all to see.

If Garp had named his child dragon, knowing perfectly well how ridiculous it sounded with his already animal-based family name, he only had himself to blame for his son turning against him.

Name aside, Dragon set himself apart from the rest of his family by being scarily smart and efficient. He had built his Revolution himself, amassing the people and funds necessary while remaining hidden. No one had had any idea anything was brewing until the Revolutionaries blew up three auction houses in a row after freeing the slaves

Buggy has never heard who Dragon’s mother is or had been, hasn’t even heard of Garp having been married at any point in his life, but something tells him the Revolutionary takes after her rather than his father. He wonders who the hell Strawhat’s mother is, and if he should be grateful that Dragon’s cold rationality and intellect had not been inherited by his son. The brat is bad enough as it is.

 

* * *

 

Buggy is stalling, and he knows it, focusing on everything but the matter at hand.

He knows it.

Doesn’t mean he wants to stop doing it, though.

Because this clusterfuck is going to go to hell in a handbasket.

But because Buggy is _smart_ , no matter what anyone else says, and because there has never been anything wrong with _his_ survival instincts unlike some others he won’t name, he forces himself to refocus on the battle in front of him.

Battle. Heh.

For all that it’s concentrated in one place and one fight, this is nothing else than a war and Buggy knows it. Doesn’t want to acknowledge it, certainly, and definitely doesn’t want to be in it because, _again,_ functioning survival instincts here, but it is a war and there’s nothing he can do to change that fact.

It’s a war between the pirates and the marines, between Freedom and Justice, a war that will decide who is right and who is wrong in the eye of the world when Buggy knows very well that all that a war decides is who is _left_.

 

* * *

 

(Edd War at ten. Buggy will never be able to forget that, no matter how much he tries. It still haunts him, that memory.)

(He remembers, all of ten years old, standing on the Oro Jackson as it faced off against Shiki’s fleet, over thirty ships, terrified out of his mind and clearly the only one feeling so.)

(Remembers begging his captain to reconsider, to leave, to agree to Shiki’s terms even if only to appease him, anything to get out of this alive because “ _Surely our lives are more important!_ ”.)

(Remembers begging Crocus to find a medical reason for Captain not to fight. Remembers turning to Rayleigh, to Scopper, to Shanks, anyone, for help and getting turned away with a laugh.)

(Remembers Rayleigh telling him to trust in Tom’s ships, Scopper that no one ever got Captain to stop when he got like that, remembers the man condescendingly patting him on the hat as he did so.)

(Remembers Shanks, so excited about the fight, nonetheless trying but failing to reassure him  _because in what world is “_ _Ah, c'mon. It's not like you're going to die no matter how much they slice you up, so what's the problem?_ _" supposed to be reassuring?_ but at least Shanks had _tried_.)

(Remembers shaking in terror and hiding as best as he could after Rayleigh threw him out of his way and told him to move it, remembers holding his knife with a death grip and plunging it in the back of a man he never learned the name of _because he was going to kill Shanks_ and throwing up as soon as he managed to get to safety again.)

(Remembers the hurricane that started up, remembers holding on a rope for his life because _he couldn’t swim anymore and the others kept forgetting and they were still fighting and no one was helping him_.)

(In retrospect, it’s surprising that it took him until after Captain’s execution to realise that most of the Roger Kaizoku didn’t give a damn about him)

 

* * *

 

War is hell and Buggy had prayed to Davy Jones to never ever be involved in one again but this is just his luck, isn’t it? And he’s not surprised that it’s all the Roger’s fault that this is happening to him again.

(Dead captain and crew both. If Roger had just kept it in his pants, none of this shit would be happening!)

 

* * *

 

 

Buggy takes another deep breath to chase away the nightmares memories (it seems like it’s all he’s doing these days), braces himself and takes another look at the battlefield.

The Shichibukai are not holding back anymore, actually stepping in the battlefield instead of remaining on their viewing platform now that it looked like the pirates might have a chance of reaching Firefist. Said young man has finally stopped begging his rescuers to stop sacrificing themselves for his sake and is now watching, silent and solemn, waiting to see on which side the coin with fall, apparently at ease with both possible outcomes. Buggy hates him a little, for that.

(In that moment, Buggy sees how Newgate’s second commander is truly Roger’s son. But he also sees Rouge, what little he can remember of her, in the boy’s freckles and curls, and he loathes that image because Blackjack D Rouge was a fucking menace who would never have tried to convince her nakama to give up on her because _she_ knew damn well they wouldn’t, because she trusted them and they her, and he wonders how bad it was, Ace’s childhood, being Roger’s child,  that he can’t even bring himself to believe _Edward fucking Newgate_ when the man calls him his son and tells him he belongs with the Shirohige Kaizoku, and he doesn’t want to think about that because it makes him angry, it makes him _furious_ , at Roger for handing himself in, at Garp for obviously fucking up when raising the kid, at the Roger Kaizoku for not intervening when they had obviously known about the brat for a long time, at the Marines for blaming the son for the father’s sins, at the world for being such a fucked up place to start with.)

~~(At himself for caring when he had promised himself he wouldn’t.)~~

 

* * *

 

 

Moria is facing up against Jimbei, using _zombies_ apparently manipulated by their _shadows_ of all things (nope, Buggy does _not_ want to know, and he is _perfectly happy_ to stay as far away from that bullshit as he can thank you very much).

(He’s definitely going to remember the salt thing, though. You never know when that kind of information is going to be useful, and it could very well save his life or that of his crew one day.)

The Revolutionary Ivankov and his army of more or less willing Okamas are wreaking havoc on their own, and Whitebeard has apparently managed to rally the other escaped prisoners to at least help distract the marines, which they appear to be doing decently at.

(They are no longer his responsibility, then, if they’ve accepted to follow Newgate’s orders, and Buggy can _feel_ that weight slip off his shoulder. Davy Jones be thanked, their lives are no longer his to worry about when he never wanted them to start with.)

Shanks’ brat is up against that annoying logia from Loguetown, Smoker something, with the seastone jutte, but before Buggy can even start to get concerned about the brat on the redhead’s behalf, another Shichibukai decides to enter the scene.

And not to help the marine.

Boa fucking Hancock. The Snake Empress of Amazon Lily has just kicked Smoker away from Strawhat and is calling him her “beloved”.

Buggy blinks.

What the fuck? How the hell did a _boy_ who isn’t even old enough to shave yet manage to win the heart of one of the male-hating Amazons, much less their fucking _Empress?_ Then again, Buggy _still_ doesn’t understand how the fuck Roger managed to convince Blackjack D Rouge that he was worth her time, and Strawhat looks like he’s cut from the same clothes as the hat’s original owner, but _still_.

Lucky bastard.

 

* * *

 

 

Buggy’s attention is diverted by Ivankov, the okama now facing against Bartholomew Kuma and looking pretty angry as he does so. No, not angry. Betrayed. ~~Davy Jones knows Buggy knows the difference between the two~~

He allows one of his ears to hover discreetly next to that particular fight when he sees Doflamingo joining in. The guy is an asshole, and it’s always better to know what the fuck he’s up to. And Buggy dearly wants to know what has the flighty okama so worked up.

It’s even worse than what he thought it could be.

Fuck Vegapunk. Fuck anyone twisted enough to conduct experiments on human beings.

Fuck Kuma for apparently agreeing to it, fuck the World Government for ordering it and fuck anyone who thought it would be a good fucking idea to turn someone into a walking corpse that had to follow every command coming from the World Government.

Fuck them for taking away a pirate’s _freedom_. Buggy might not have believed in all of his Captain’s ideals, but that one? That one that they had shared.

  
Just when it looks like Ivankov doesn’t know how to react to that news, the newly turned Pacifista PX-0 fires a laser blast from his mouth, sending the okama and the Strawhat flying away, before appearing in the middle of the former’s okama army and laying waste to them. That’s enough to rise Ivankov, apparently, and he reacts with vicious vengeance.

At least the creep cares about his people, Buggy thinks bitterly, recalling his ear back to its proper position. He could not say the same about other people. Sengoku has disengaged from Rayleigh and is simply watching as his men die by the dozen, some of them hit by “friendly fire” even.

 

* * *

 

 

There’s a scuffle over by Newgate’s side as Crocodile makes another attempt on the man’s head, but he’s quickly punched back by ‘Diamond’ Jozu and lands by Doflamingo. Buggy flinches when Whitebeard’s third commander is caught by the Shichibukai’s puppeteering strings, but Crocodile proves useful for once and manages to break them without intending to when he sends both Devil Fruit users away from himself.

And because Shanks’ stupid brat can’t keep out of trouble for five fucking minutes, by the time Buggy is looking for him again he’s off facing against _Dracule fucking Mihawk_.

He was soooo telling Shanks. Let the redhead deal with his dear rival if the man harmed his protege. It would serve the swordsman right, Buggy should not be the only one of Shanks’ friends to have to keep an eye on the kid for Davy Jones’ sake!

Thankfully, Whitebeard’s order to keep the brat safe seems to be working, and the Fifth Commander, ‘Floral Blade’ Vista, is quick to intervene on the brat’s behalf.

But not fast enough to stop Hawkeye from drawing Strawhat’s blood… nor to stop the brat from awakening his observation Haki, if Buggy’s own is reporting the truth.

(What the fuck, Garp? How the hell could the old fucker _not_ teach his fucking grandson how to use Haki? _Buggy_ has known how to use both Armament and Observation since he was _eight_ , and he knows he wasn’t the best student out there! There is _no excuse_ for Garp not teaching the brat when he _knew_ the boy would need it at some point, marine or pirate! Especially with who his fucking father was! The boy should not be awakening his on accident in the middle of a fucking war!)

Then his Haki catches something that has him physically turn around and send one of his eyes to look over the wall he’s hiding behind, because this is… _not right_. Not quite Voices yet the presences seem familiar nonetheless. He understands when he sees the looming forms, identical to Bartholomew Kuma in all but V _oice_.

Pacifistas, Doflamingo called them. They had apparently been meant to drive Newgate’s ally into the bay and corner them there, but the wily old man had ordered them to scatter a few moments earlier, foiling Sengoku’s plan, according to what Buggy’s dropped ear managed to gather (also the person leading Vegapunk’s monstruous creations apparently answers to Kizaru and calls the man a mafia-version of Boss, which is _weird_ but also really not something Buggy should be focusing on right now when there are literally over two dozen war machines marching towards him).

War machines that do not give a damn for the marines getting caught in their attacks, apparently. Buggy winces as the lasers hit, the entire plaza shaking from the sheer force of it.

Then Little Oars roars, followed by Gulliver, and both giants rush for the Pacifista with wicked smiles on their faces, and Buggy stops looking that way because the monsters are taking care of the monstrosities and that’s good enough for him, he doesn’t need to watch it happen.

On the battlefield, Shirohige’s commanders are rushing to create a path towards their Second Commander, blasting Kizaru away from Strawhat as they do so.

Despite the Pacifista’s arrival, everything seems to be going well for the pirates.

Too well.

 

* * *

 

There’s something at the back of his mind that is screaming at him to pay attention, and Buggy has survived this long because he has always listened to that voice and he’s not about to stop know. He expands his haki again, focuses on it more than on his eyesight, and _listens._

There’s something _wrong wrong wrong wrong_ on the Moby Dick.

Buggy can’t quite figure what, exactly, but if he were a betting man he would bet on it having something to do with the spider guy, Squardo, that he notices hanging back behind Whitebeard. His Haki is fluctuating weirdly for someone who is not currently fighting, and the glares he sends towards the execution platform are a. full of hate and b. not directed at the marines. And given that the main reason Buggy remembers the guy’s name is because the Roger Kaizoku destroyed the crew he had belonged to before forming his own, back during the Edd War...

There is no way any of this is going to end well.

And there’s nothing Buggy can do to change that. This is a war of giants, a war of monsters, and he has learned long ago that he does not belong with them. A quick double-check with Haki tells him what he already suspected.

Whitebeard is aware of Squardo’s suspicious behaviour. And he’s not going to do anything about it.

 

* * *

 

 

Because Whitebeard is already dying. He has been for a while, from what Buggy can gather, and he knows it. His doctor knows it. His nurses know it. His commanders know it - except maybe Firefist.

Whitebeard, the last great captain of the Pirate King’s era, is dying.

And this is how he wants to go out: fighting alongside the pirates he calls his children to save a son who will always be his more than his rival.

Buggy thinks it’s stupid.

Buggy thinks it’s brave.

But mostly, he thinks it’s _right_. It’s right for the kind of man Edward Newgate always has been, the man for whom the greatest treasure has always been his family of choice rather all the gold of the world. It’s right for him to die protecting them, surrounding them, even if it will also hurt them more than anything else the world could throw at them.

Buggy doesn’t like Whitebeard. He’s an asshole and a monster and he’s been making fun of his nose ever since Buggy first met him.

Buggy doesn’t understand him either, doesn’t understand how he can open his heart to all these people, how he can deal with shouldering all of their lives without faltering, how he can have so much faith in them.

Buggy doesn’t like Whitebeard, doesn’t understand him either. But, he thinks as he meets the man’s eyes from his hiding place, Buggy has always respected him. And right in this moment, Buggy thinks he respects Whitebeard more than he ever has Roger.

Edward Newgate had set out at sea to find a family. Gol D. Roger had set out at sea to find adventure.

Both of them found themselves sick, dying, and both of them had a choice to make.

Roger chose to go out in one last burst of glory, unable to accept a slow and painful death, choosing instead to ensure his name would be remembered for all eternity (cursing his own son to a miserable life before he was even born, leaving Blackjack D. Rouge to die in childbirth, Rouge the pirate forgotten by the world and Rouge the lover hunted by it, leaving his ‘cherished’ nakama behind without an explanation, abandoning two kids who saw him as their father). Gol D. Roger had been selfish, when choosing his death and Buggy will never forgive him for it.

Newgate has made his choice, Buggy knows. He will die in this fight, not for one last burst of glory, but because it is the best way for him to protect his family one last time, before the illness leaves him nothing but a burden on his ‘children’, before his decaying state leaves them worried and strained and weakened in front of their enemies. He will die protecting them, probably by covering their retreat once they get their hands on Firefist, and he will tell them to live, because that is the kind of man he is, and they will, because those will be his last orders, his last wishes, and none of them will dare to disobey them. They will leave and they will live, and they will grieve, and then they will come back, led by the Phoenix who had been at Whitebeard’s side the longest.

Edward Newgate has always been extraordinarily selfless when it comes to his children.

Being close to death doesn’t change the man he is. It magnifies it, maybe. Buggy can feel it on his Voice, the strong love and pride and protectiveness for those children who the world had rejected and who had become his.

Buggy can’t help but think that his death will be more meaningful than Roger’s, for all that it had sent the world into a new piracy age.

And so Buggy holds Whitebeard’s eyes, and he nods carefully, his right hand on his heart in a small bow, and he forces himself to watch as Squardo suddenly moves in front of Whitebeard and stabs him through the chest.

 

* * *

 

Fushichō Marco _roars_ and slams the offender into the ground, but it’s too late. The sword might not have hit Newgate’s heart, the Squardo guy is not nearly tall enough for that, but _every single fighter_ , pirate and marine, has stopped to stare as the unthinkable happened.

In the silence that follows, the Vortex Spider’s accusations ring loud and clear.

“It's your fault this had to happen! Stop this stupidity Whitebeard! I have talked to the marines! I know that they promised to spare the lives of you, your crew and even Ace!”

Buggy glares at the man from his hiding place, knows it’s useless but does so anyway because Newgate is one of the biggest monsters out there and at his most fearsome when he is protecting those he has named his children, a monster strong enough to take on every single marine out there and _win_ and Buggy knows, _knows_ that this is a trick, that one of the marines (Sengoku, probably, or that hothead Akainu) lied to the guy to convince him to turn on his father to save his own crew, has managed to convince someone that Edward fucking Newgate would turn his back on his allies, and this is Ace all over again except Firefist “just” believes he’s not worth it while Squardo believes he’s been betrayed and Buggy doesn’t know which one is worse.  
  
“We were tricked! I had not idea that Ace was Gol D. Roger's son!  When you found me, I was all alone! You know the reason, don't you? It was because all my friends, my comrades for so many years, were all killed by Roger! You know how much I hate Roger!”  
  
_Called it_ , Buggy thinks, and he hates it, but his Haki catches Crocus’ surprise and unease at that declaration and he can’t help but feel vindicated.

 _How does it feel to be confronted by the consequences of your actions?_ he thinks viciously, and can’t bring himself to feel bad about it.  
  
“So you should have said something!” Squardo is roaring. “You should have told me that Ace was Roger's son, and that you were guiding him to be the next Pirate King! But no! And then you even agreed to work with them!”  
  
He gestures angrily at the Oro Jackson, and, _yes_ , Buggy gets it, he really really does, but Newgate doesn’t seem like he had a fucking clue the Roger Kaizoku were coming and actually seemed pretty pissed off about it when he talked to Buggy earlier, so Squardo should really not be blaming the old man for that, especially when he could just try and use the chaos of the battle to get his revenge on _the actual crew who killed his friends instead of, you know, the guy who never knew Roger and had actually sailed with Squardo and been one of his friends_?  
  
“That was already a betrayal! What a fool I was for treating Ace like a friend! And then when your precious little Ace was captured... You sold us out! You traded the lives of the 43 captains under you for Ace's life! Your crew and Ace will be spared! You made a deal with Sengoku! It's true, isn't it? And we had no idea! We've been fighting for you and for Ace! Look!”  
  
He points at the destroyed ships behind the Moby Dick.  
  
“Who are the Marines targeting? That's right, us! We are trapped by the ice! We have nowhere to run! It is a miracle you allowed me to get a blow in... but now I am ready! Just kill me!”

Everything Squardo just said is true, Buggy knows it. He’s been keeping track of what was happening ever since he got catapulted onto the plaza. Whitebeard’s allies have taken the heaviest losses. They’re the ones who have been targeted the most by the marines.

Of _fucking_ course it’s true. Sengoku would have given the orders specifically so they would coincide with the story whichever underling he sent to con Squardo had been told to tell. It had to be _believable_.

And that’s the worst part, isn’t it? It _is_ being believed. The whispers have started already, so many of them that Buggy can’t even keep track, even with both ears in different places.

“No way, it can't be! But come to think of it, we are the only ones being attacked!”  
  
“I didn't want to believe it... I even doubted my own eyes!” Squardo continues.  
  
“You fool! You were tricked! Why didn't you trust the boss!?” Newgate’s first commander is forcibly holds the traitor face down to the ground.  
  
“Don't give me that Marco!”  
  
“It's true that Ace is Roger's son…” Whitebeard states calmly, as if uncaring of the sword planted in his torso. “They manipulated you, knowing how that information would affect you... they are one step ahead of us…”  
  
Buggy holds back a snort, because _no kidding_ . The only thing Sengoku probably didn’t plan for today was the Roger Kaizoku deciding to suddenly come out of retirement.

 

* * *

 

It’s Crocodile who breaks the silence that follows, spitting on the ground in fury.  
  
“You are pathetic, Whitebeard! You weren't this weak when you defeated me!!”  
  
_He wasn’t fucking dying when he defeated you, asshole_ , Buggy mutters under his breath at the former Shichibukai. Does no one know how to use Observation Haki anymore? The old man feels like he’s been dying for a while now, actually, like he’s been walking side by side with Davy Jones for months if not years and has just managed to keep the captain of the ** _Flying Dutchman_** interested enough in his antics to convince him not to drag him down to his locker yet.

Buggy wouldn’t be surprised if Davy Jones was sitting on the Moby Dick’s railing at this very moment, drinking merily as he watches this clusterfuck unfold. Sea knows Davy Jones probably hasn’t had that kind of entertainment since Roger got himself executed.

At least  _someone_ is enjoying this mess.

 

* * *

 

 _Of fucking course_ , not even getting stabbed by his own son will get Whitebeard to stop being a fucking bleeding heart.

Nooooo. Now he’s a  _literal_ one on top of being a  _figurative_ one, and that doesn’t stop him from _hugging_ the man who just tried to kill him.

Fucking monster, seriously.

“Squardo... you dare to raise your sword against your father... my foolish son! But though you may be a fool, I still love you…” Newgate declares for all to hear.  
  
“You must be joking! You sold us out!”  
  
“Who was it? Who turned the heart of one as loyal as yourself into the darkness?” Whitebeard demands, and yes, Buggy wants to know too, even if he can guess.

Fucking Sengoku, seriously. Turning a man against his father is bad enough, but trying to tarnish Whitebeard’s reputation like that, when the old man is on the verge of death already?

To be expected from a fucking marine, admittedly, they did the same to Roger and neither man were exactly saints, but this is turning Newgate’s _treasure_ against him and that is _low._

Outlaws they might be, but pirates have their own honor and this is spitting on Newgate’s before pouring Sea-King shit on top of it, then inviting people to piss on it.

 Roger might have respected the strategist, once, but Buggy has only ever considered him a monster and today is definitely not changing his mind.

 At least Whitebeard’s a honorable monster, and so’s Garp to a lesser extent even if the man is a fucking asshole who Buggy will never forgive for allowing Roger to let himself be captured by him.

“It was one of the marines, a member of a rebel faction! He said if I killed you my crew would be spared!”

  _Called it. Again._ For once, Buggy very much dislikes being right. 

“So it was Akainu, was it? I know how much you hate Roger... I'm painfully aware of it. But Squad, it's ridiculous to hold children accountable for the sins of their fathers... what has Ace done to you? Be friends with him... Ace is not the only special one... you are all... my family. You really think I would sell out my children?”

Newgate is panting as he finishes his tirade, but he stands tall and proud even with blood pouring out of his chest as he clenches his fist and _shatters_ the ice blocking his allies’ ships in a thousand pieces, freeing them all in one go.

 

* * *

 

 

 _Definitely a monster still_ , Buggy thinks, and he can’t quite help the small, sad smile that forms on his lips. Definitely a monster, and one Buggy has never wanted anything to do with either as an enemy or as an ally, but…  
  
“If you call yourself pirates!” Whitebeard roars out, his voice heard by even the most distant ships. “Then choose for yourself what to believe! Those who would follow me... be ready to lose your lives! Come with me!”  


_The sea will be lesser without his presence._

 


	6. Oh, blow the man down, bullies, blow the man down!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fuck. Crocus had sworn he would never do this again, had stayed away for a reason because his Captain was dead and he hadn’t been able to heal him and it hurt, it still hurts to this day that Roger stopped letting him even try. So he had said never again, had fucked off to the twin Capes and that selfharming whale waiting for people who would never come back and tried not to feel like he was looking in a mirror everytime he went to heal Laboon. Had sworn to never again get attached to lunatics with too fucking big smiles and too fucking big dreams and too fucking big hearts because they left too fucking big holes in his chest that he’ll never be able to heal.
> 
> And yet. Here he is. Trying to save yet another lunatic with a too big smile and too big dreams and a too big heart, trying to save the son of his previous bespoke lunatic, too, and he can tell already that he won't be able to stay distant, that he’ll let them in and get attached to the damn brats.
> 
> (Who is he trying to kidd, he’s the one who brought them all here to save one boy, the one who got attached to a boy with his captain’s eyes and a menace’s freckles. He has no room to talk, really.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys!
> 
> Sorry for the long wait, the past few months have been hectic between finishing my dissertation, moving back home, looking for jobs, etc...
> 
> But here I am, with a new Crocus chapter! Buggy's next chapter is nearly done, I hope to be able to post it by the end of next week.
> 
> Hope you'll like it, let me know what you think!

Oh, blow the man down, bullies, blow the man down!  
To me way-aye, blow the man down.   
Oh, Blow the man down, bullies, blow him right down!   
Give me some time to blow the man down!

 

(Blow the man down, Songs of American Sailormen, by Joanna Colcord)

* * *

They charge on the ice, running towards the steadier ground of the plaza, and Crocus feels more alive than he has in years, adrenaline running through his veins.

Whitebeard himself is on the move, stepping off the Moby Dick and onto the battlefield proper, onto the ice, and Crocus has to remind himself to breathe.

It feels like being back in time, or nearly so, preparing for a massive clash of titans. Except that Newgate had never fought the Roger Kaizoku with the intent to kill, or even to permanently harm anyone. His captain had just enjoyed having a good fight with one of the few people in the world who could truly keep up with him. But this, this is different. Because Newgate is done waiting, is done waiting for others to stop being morons.

For the first time in over a decade, Edward Newgate joins a battlefield.

It’s not that he hasn’t fought in all that time, of course. But most of these had been single opponents, arrogant wannabes trying to take his head, and most of them had ended up joining his crew afterwards, Ace being a prime example of that. Fights for his honor or that of his crew, Newgate had never backed down from. But when it came to the everyday skirmishes with the marines or smaller pirate crews, he had taken to letting his crew deal with them. Crocus hadn’t thought much about it, at the time, but in hindsight it was obvious that the older man had been forced to take a step back by his failing body.

Crocus will probably never know for sure, because the Nightingale will never agree to tell him or let him have access to that information in any way or shape, but he doesn’t think that Newgate is sick like Roger was. But the man is old, over seventy already, and Crocus might be the same age but he’s led a much healthier life than the Yonko. If he were a betting man, he would bet that Newgate’s liver was on its last few cells, given how much he drank on a daily basis. And with how stubborn he has always been, Crocus doubts that he would have given up on his precious saké.

But no, he thinks, looking back to the Nightingale again. She wouldn’t have allowed that to happen, would have disobeyed even a direct order if it meant keeping her Oyaji alive a little longer. Whatever Newgate has, it isn’t something she can treat.

Crocus can relate. When this bullshit is over, he’ll need to see if she would be up to go for a couple of drinks to rage about stupid Captains not having the decency to catch something treatable and deciding to die in front of their doctors anyway. They could start a club, he thinks bitterly, pretty sure that the Blackjack's medic masquerading as a tank would join them. He shakes himself. He needs to stay in the here and now, and here and now Whitebeard is still standing, and standing strong despite the bleeding wound on his torso.

He does not look diminished in any way, be it by old age or illness or injury, and the Marines on the ice in front of them take a step back.

“Get ready! The world's strongest man is about to attack!” Sengoku roars as Whitebeard takes a step, then another.

Next to Crocus, the Declaban brothers are busy shouting orders.

“Open a path for our old man! Squardo, that idiot! He let marines trick him and he actually stabbed the old man! There can be no greater shame! Just how tough must this be for him to bear! We'll never forgive you, Marines!”

Fucking Shirohige Kaizoku. Squardo just betrayed them, raised his sword against the one he called Oyaji, and yet here they are, more insulted on Squardo’s behalf than angry at him. If it weren’t for assholes like Teach, they really would be too good to be true.

John Giant suddenly appears in front of the rushing pirates, and Crocus swears as he quickly dodges the giant’s katana even as younger pirates go flying around him. Their own giants are still occupied with the Pacifistas, Gulliver and Oars apparently having a friendly competition on who can take out the most. The mechanical bodies are piling up on the edge of the plaza in two distinct piles. Well. At least they’re having fun, Crocus muses wryly, before having to dodge again as katana and bisento clash over his head.

He takes a moment to catch his breath as Newgate pushes the giant away, then turns the air blue when he notices Whitebeard’s stance. Quickly, Crocus grabs on the closest stalactite, swearing again as his fingers make contact with the ice, but it’s worth the discomfort when Newgate decides to _tilt the entire freaking island and the block of ice around it._ Fucking inconsiderate Devil Fruit users. Just because his crew is used to his antics doesn’t mean his allies are for fuck’s sake!

Another punch from Newgate and John the Giant is out of the fight, possibly of the living realm.

* * *

 _That’s a lot of broken bones_ , Crocus muses, morbidly fascinated by the effect of the Quake Quake fruit on living beings. The next wave of powers tears down buildings all around them, proving that the fruit’s effects are actually quite versatile, really.

For a moment, it looks like the Yonko has succeeded in bringing down the execution platform, but Crocus can’t even muster the energy to be surprised when it is revealed that the three admirals managed to shield it. None of them are anywhere near Sengoku’s level, wouldn’t be able to take down Whitebeard in his prime, but Crocus has to admit that they’re good. Working together to repel that kind of attack is not an easy task, especially when the people involved don’t get along.

(The three of them are fucking bickering, or that’s what it looks like from Crocus’s spot on the ice that is still riding the aftershocks of Newgate’s first quake. They’re in the middle of a battlefield, facing down the Strongest Man on the Seas, and they’re bickering like children. Overconfidence or really that skilled? Both, Crocus thinks. And true dislike for each other, too - that Aokiji fellow looks like he’s the only one with a hint of ethics left in his body, and the other two have clearly left that behind decades ago.)

A quick glance to his left reveals that Strawhat somehow managed not to get himself killed or grievously injured during the showdown. Ah, Jimbei is standing next to him, that explains it. Good. The brat made a promise to Laboon and he better keep it. Plus, if anything happens to the kid under his watch, Shanks would never shut up about it. He misses the days when he could put _that_ brat on cleaning duty when he got too loud for Crocus’ tastes.

Around him, Whitebeard’s men, emboldened by their father’s actions, are rushing towards the stone of the plaza. But Crocus is still watching Strawhat as the boy stretches his arms toward the execution platform and thinks _this is too easy_.

He is proven right when the boy’s hands are swept away as a massive steel wall rises all around the plaza, encircling the ice-bound pirates and preventing them from accessing the dry grounds. The Blackjacks are the only ones who remain on the other side of the wall, and from the furious tint to Yadomaru’s haki, they’re outnumbered and they know it.

Sometimes, Crocus really, really _hates_ being right. He grips his harpoon anyway and follows the Whitebeard pirates closest to him. Sengoku might have had a plan, but Whitebeard is a wily one. That, and Rush had smirked knowingly when the Shirohige ships had surfaced, so odds were that there was a plan to get out of this shit.

Wait.

Is that…?

* * *

Crocus laughs. Loudly. Loud enough that pirates around him turn to see who is making that noise, and take a step back when they recognise him.

(It’s nice to be famous, he thinks, and laughs even more)

The encircling wall rose in sections, covering most of the plaza… except that two sections haven’t been able to come up. Two sections just slightly to the left of the execution platform.

They’re blocked by the piles of Pacifista that Gulliver and Oars are still adding to.

The Marine’s secret machines are preventing the full deployment of the Marine’s other secret machine and it’s _hilarious._

Until Sengoku orders Akainu to destroy the very ice Crocus and the others are standing on. To his right, Elena swears.

“Magma hail was _not_ on the forecast for today!” The navigator complains, and swings a haki-covered Jacob’s staff, punting a ball of magma back to its sender.

But not everyone is so lucky, and Crocus can’t help but wince as the screams reach him. He tries to help where he can, drags people away from the edges of boiling matter, but already he can see that the water might be their only chance of survival.

The water which is currently going from ice-cold to boiling hot. This is not going to be comfor… _is that asshole aiming for the Oro Jackson?!_

He is. For the Oro Jackson and the Moby Dick. The latter is destroyed in an instant, and Crocus swears. That ship had sailed the sea for the past forty years. Fucking Marines. No respect at all for good craftsmanship.

Fuck. Crocus is pretty sure that the Moby has a Klabautermann. It’s that kind of ship, that kind of crew. He hopes the being will be able to move onto one of the smaller ships until its crew can get a new mothership built.

(The Oro Jackson had one too, Crocus knows. He’s never seen it, but there were times when the ship had moved on her own to save them, when Rush had woken up in the morning to find that repairs had been made overnight. Crocus tries not to wonder what happened to it after the crew disbanded, if it’s still there or not. He hopes it is. He’s terrified it’s not.)

At the Oro Jackson’s steering wheel, Rush is glaring daggers at Akainu even as she expertly manoeuvers the ship to evade the flying magma. Around her, the Adam Wood is glowing darkly, the shipwright’s haki seeping into it to reinforce it. Rush is hardening the entire ship with her Armament, and Crocus wastes a few precious seconds gaping at the sight. He didn’t know she could do that! Heck, he didn’t know _anyone_ could do that! Their shipwright has suddenly become even more terrifying that she already was, and Crocus _does not know how to deal with that!_

“Don’t you dare scratch _my fucking ship!_ ” said tiny shipwright roars, her voice easily heard even over the pained screams. “I’m going to tear you to shreds for what you did to the Moby! That ship was a fucking fine piece of craftsmanship! She was a work of _art,_ you heathens!”

Well. At least Akainu wouldn’t be a problem for much longer if Rush got her hands on him. She looked furious, and Crocus has made it a point to never get on the wrong side of a woman who looks like that. Rush is five foot nothing of grease monkey and rage. He knows better.

Around him, the struggling Whitebeard pirates are staring at what little is left from their home with devastated faces, but quickly shake themselves out of it, trying desperately to make it to the few remaining blocks of ice. Someone fires a cannon at the wall, but the payload rebounds straight in their gut.

The wall is, apparently, slightly elastic. What. The. Fuck. Not even Whitebeard’s power makes a dent in it.

Oh well. The pacifista path is still open, though the ice leading to it has been destroyed. They’ll be bottlenecked there, easy prey for marine snipers, but it was better than being boiled alive.

Fuck. Looks like he’ll have to swim anyway. He’s getting too old for this bullshit. How does Sengoku stand it? That asshole is pushing what, seventy-seven now? And still a Fleet Admiral in charge of this clusterfuck. That man needs to retire for fuck’s sake.

* * *

As if wanting to prove him wrong, the strategist grabs a denden to make another announcement, loud enough to be heard by everyone around them.

“Almost everything is going according to plan. We will now proceed with the execution of Portgas D. Ace!”

That. That, right there, is pure provocation. It’s going to piss everyone off and Sengoku _knows it_. Is counting on it, on them making mistakes. Well, joke’s on him, Crocus thinks, because he knows that the Roger Kaizoku showing up was definitely not planned for. And if there’s one thing they’ve always been good at, it’s foiling someone else’s plans in the most chaotic way possible.

But in the meantime, the Shirohige are rushing to the openings Oars and Gulliver have so gallantly provided, and Strawhat is leading them. Crocus swears, looks at Elena, who nods. He runs straight at her and she cups her hands together. He jumps, sets his foot in her palms, and she throws him to the next ice block in one swift motion.

By the time he makes it to where Ivankov is standing, the fucking moron had the time to get blown back (literally blown back, that was one heck of an explosion, seriously) and get himself thrown back in, courtesy of Jimbei.

What. The. Fuck. How the fuck is that brat still moving?! Why the hell is no one sitting down on him to make him stop and get proper medical treatment?!

(Oh. Right. The brat seems to think that Ivankov is an actual medical practitioner, and no one listen to their fucking doctors anyway. Fuck his life.)

(Fucking D’s and their stupid charisma, making people listen to them even when they should really know better.)

Crocus can’t see him, but his observation haki tells him that Strawhat is facing off against all three admirals. At once. On his own.

There are less painful ways to commit suicide, Crocus wants to scream, and fuck he’s responsible for this kid, because Laboon and Shanks and he’s too old for this shit! His nakama are too far away, even Rayleigh who is currently running across the ice faster than Crocus thought him capable off. None of them will make it in time if the Admirals decide to stop playing around and decide that Garp’s wrath will be worth it.

“Get me over there!” He screams at Jimbei instead, ignoring how the fishman startles upon recognising him.

Seriously, get on with the program Jimbei, Crocus has been here since the whole fucking thing started, it shouldn’t be that surprising, surely?

Before Jimbei can shake himself out of it, Crocus feels the boy hit the ground, hard, and Sengoku’s voice rings over the battlefield.

“Proceed!”

* * *

Over Crocus’ head, Marco the Phoenix is flying as fast as his blue wings will allow him, desperation clear in his every movement. From where he’s standing, Crocus can just about make out the execution platform, Ace’s still form, the two Marines on each side, the raised swords…

 _Not again_ , he begs Davy Jones. _Please, not again_ , and then Strawhat’s voice breaks through the air.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!” Shanks’ protegé screams, and then there’s movement, too fast for Crocus to see, and the two soldiers fall from the platform, knocked out or dead Crocus can’t bring himself to care.

That’s his captain’s son, sea damn it!

The movement reappears, a column of sand gathering to form a human being.

“You!” Sengoku rages. “Because of the grudge you hold against him, you are the last person we expected to assist Whitebeard! Crocodile!”

The former Shichibukai looks way too smug, but for once Crocus is glad to see his face.

“I can finish the old geezer off later... but seeing you scum so cheerful makes me sick!” The Sand user spits, before losing his head.

Literally.

Doflamingo just came out of nowhere and decapitated Crocodile with his strings.

And that’s not even enough to kill the bastard. His head just dissolves into sand and reforms on his body. Crocus wants to know so badly, but he also very much does not want to know. Ever.

Fucking Devil Fruit users, seriously. Let them fight each other, Crocus does not want to deal with either of them.

He has enough to worry about with the Gomu Gomu idiot, who is about to be killed by Aokiji until the Phoenix interferes.

Crocus breathes out in relief. Fuck. That kid is going to give him a heart-attack.

“You’re doing this for Laboon” he mutters to himself. “For Laboon and to save your ears from Shanks’ complaints.”

He’s pretty sure Ivankov and Jimbei are looking at him like he’s finally lost it, but he doesn’t care.

(He’s also pretty sure he lost his last marble when he agreed to join Gol Fucking D Roger’s crew, anyway.)

* * *

Around him, the Whitebeard pirates have started moving again, swimming hastily towards Oars who is batting away cannonballs like they’re flies. The marines start to notice, but before they can act on it and target the swimmers, a dark shape rises from the waters and Crocus wants to laugh again even as he jumps from the ice to join the Shirohige in the water.

That’s another Moby Dick, smaller than the original but equipped with paddles, and it picks up most of the swimmers in one go before moving surprisingly quickly in Oars’s direction.

Gulliver, who has just finished turning the last Pacifista into scrap metal, catches on quickly. Oars grabs the left side of the ship, Gulliver the right, and together they heave it through the opening they’ve made and straight onto the plaza.

Crocus waves at Gulliver even as he hurries towards where he can sense Strawhat’s too weak Haki. In the background, he’s aware of Whitebeard’s unmistakable presence, shining strong as ever despite his current strength, blowing away hordes of marines with a single swing.

“The time has finally come!” The strongest man in the world roars. “We're going to rescue Ace! And take out the whole Naval force!”

“Geez,” Crocus mutters, but he’s smiling. “Could you be any louder, old man?”

On the platform, Sengoku is standing, saying something to Garp even as he rolls his sleeves up.

“Looks like this war... insists on the two of us participating!” Crocus hears, but doesn’t focus on it except to roll his eyes briefly, still searching for Strawhat.

Well duh. Of course we’re going to insist on the two of you participating, you moron, you’re the one who planned this fucking mess! It also looks like Sengoku forgot he had been fighting Rayleigh less than thirty minutes ago, even though he’s still sporting the cuts from that particular fight.Or do the Rogers no longer count as valid opponents these days? Senile asshole.

Despite Sengoku’s words, the admirals are the ones who confront Whitebeard first anyway, Aokiji leading the charge  Crocus wishes them luck as he keeps an eye on their battle and another out for a stretching idiot. Quakes cannot be frozen and the man is a natural disaster all by himself.

He finally locks in on Strawhat’s location, but it’s too late, Kizaru gets there first and Crocus can only watch in horror as a ray of light pierces the boy’s body.

Crocus watches as Monkey D Luffy collapses on the ground, somehow still conscious despite the pain and the bloodloss, single mindedly focused on his brother even as Kizaru approaches him, and rages.

* * *

Crocus is a doctor, first, last and always. He was a doctor before he became a pirate and he has never stopped being one. This day has been testing the last of his patience, smothering the healer to let the fighter through, but this is the straw the breaks the seaking’s back.

Not. On. His. Watch!

The asshole in a suit kicks the kid away, propulsing him straight into Whitebeard, who thankfully manages to catch him.

“For the great Whitebeard to make such an error in judgment... the mighty have indeed fallen!” He drawls, and Crocus’s fingers itch to strangle him. “For a man of your stature to be so reckless... you let your emotions get the better of you when you allowed this pile of garbage to lead the charge…”

Kizaru doesn’t see him coming, gets hit by a haki-darkened harpoon in the face that wipes off his stupidly smug grin and breaks his precious glasses, all in one go.

Better yet, the momentum carries the admiral right into Rayleigh’s sword. The Oro Jackson’s first mate’s face is set in stone, no traces left of the kind old man who helps the rookies who make it to Sabaody.

“That,” Rayleigh says calmly even as Kizaru tries to move away from the sword piercing his shoulder, “was a mistake, Borsalino.”

And, fuck, this is not Rayleigh being pissed off about an allies injuries, or about Shanks’ charge. This is Rayleigh taking it _personally_ . Rayleigh got _attached_ to the little brat, Rayleigh thinks the kid’s got _potential_ and Rayleigh quite possibly thinks the kid is the second coming of Roger and that means Crocus will be seeing a lot more of Monkey D Luffy in the future than he has a ever wanted to. Because Rayleigh will want to make sure the brat is ready for the New World, will want to train him personally to make sure he makes it to Raftel, and he will ask them for help.

And Crocus will answer, like the idiot he is, because twenty years is a long time and fuck but he missed this, missed them, the crazies that he had gone to end of the world with, and he’s not sure he can go back to his quiet life at the Twin Capes after this. He’ll have to make arrangements, bring Laboon over somehow, and…

Fuck. Crocus had sworn he would never do this again, had stayed away for a reason because his Captain was dead and he hadn’t been able to heal him and it _hurt_ , it still hurts to this day that Roger stopped letting him even _try_. So he had said never again, had fucked off to the twin Capes and that selfharming whale waiting for people who would never come back and tried not to feel like he was looking in a mirror everytime he went to heal Laboon. Had sworn to never again get attached to lunatics with too fucking big smiles and too fucking big dreams and too fucking big hearts because they left too fucking big holes in his chest that he’ll never be able to heal.

And yet. Here he is. Trying to save yet another lunatic with a too big smile and too big dreams and a too big heart, trying to save the son of his previous bespoke lunatic, too, and he can tell already that he won't be able to stay distant, that he’ll let them in and get _attached_ to the damn brats.

(Who is he trying to kidd, he’s the one who brought them all here to save one boy, the one who got attached to a boy with his captain’s eyes and a menace’s freckles. He has no room to talk, really.)

* * *

Crocus leaves Rayleigh to it no matter how much he wants to hurt the bastard. He has a patient to treat, and patients always come first. So instead he runs up to Whitebeard’s side where the man’s doctors are trying to bandage Strawhat.

Trying, because of course the moron is fighting them, despite his condition, trying to get to his brother.

“I don't need to be taken care of! We're running out of time! I said move it! Ace... Ace is the only brother I've got in this world!” The words are heart-wrenching, but don’t stop Crocus from making his way to him, already rummaging through his satchel for the necessary supplies. “I'm coming... I'll... save you!”

The youngest Monkey on the battlefield finally collapses, and Jimbei goes frantic. When the hell did the fishman have time to get attached to that menace? What is it about Monkey D Luffy that makes old timers like Rayleigh and Jimbei throw their weight behind him like that?

Crocus scratches that line of thoughts. The brat is a D and that should be explanation enough for all this bullshit, really. That, and Crocus has sworn decades ago to never again try to figure out what made the D.’s so special. Never again. Never ever again. He’s learned his lesson. There are things normal people are not meant to try and understand and that’s one of them.

“Luffy! Doctor, please do what you can to revitalize him!”

Crocus snorts even as he elbows Whitebeard’s people out of the way. The only one he would even remotely trust with a brat that both Shanks and Jimbei have taken an interest in is the Nightingale, and she’s sticking close to her captain. He’s starting to suspect that she might have eaten a healing fruit, given that Newgate’s wound should be bleeding a lot more than it currently is.

“Jimbei!” Said injured captain says. “This kid has heart, but he's too reckless. He's full of spunk but nothing but talk! Still... I've always had a soft spot for idiots like him!”

“You’re one to talk,” Crocus scoffs, getting to work on his patient now that he is conveniently too out of it to protest. “You and Roger, I swear. You’re both assholes who should have listened to your ship’s medic more often. I don’t know how she puts up with you if even half the things I’ve heard in the past few years are true.”

“Gurarararara!” Newgate laughs, then winces when the Nightingale pinches him sharply. “Focus on the brat, you old fart. He needs your help more than I do.”

“You’re older than I am, you fossile!” Crocus snaps back, but doesn’t look away from his patient.

In the background, the battle resumes.

 


	7. Fire on the waters, fire high above, Fire in our hearts for the friends that we love. Fire, fire, fire down below, Fetch a bucket of water, Fire down below.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crocus is furious, Buggy notes detachedly. And so is Rayleigh, on whose sword Kizaru impales himself as he stumbles back from Crocus’ attack.
> 
> “That,” Rayleigh says calmly even as Kizaru tries to move away from the sword piercing his shoulder, “was a mistake, Borsalino.”
> 
> (They were never this angry on his behalf, Buggy thinks, even though he actually sailed with them for years, even though Rayleigh had been his teacher and Crocus his doctor, they had never stepped in like that to protect him unless they absolutely had to, and even then it had always been followed with lectures about how he should never have allowed himself to get into such a situation in the first place or how he should have been strong enough to deal with it himself and Buggy thought he had managed to distanciate himself from them enough that such a reminder wouldn’t hurt so much but obviously that hadn’t worked and he needs to stop thinking about this because if he doesn’t he won’t make it through this bullshit alive and he refuses to die because of them.)
> 
> Buggy needs a fucking drink.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As promised, here's Buggy's chapter - with extra Shanks feels!
> 
> And, well, more Bitter!Buggy, but you're used to that by now ;) 
> 
> I decline any and all responsibility for feels or angst or tears.
> 
> I'm currently working on chapter 8 (more Crocus! and Crocus finally getting to be a medic and to yell at people who don't let their doctors do their jobs!) but it will probably take me another week or two to get it done.
> 
> Hope you'll like it!
> 
> Chapter title from the Sea Shanty "Fire Down Below"

> Fire on the waters, fire high above,  
> Fire in our hearts for the friends that we love.  
>  _Fire, fire, fire down below,  
>  Fetch a bucket of water,  
> Fire down below._
> 
> (Fire down below)

* * *

 

Buggy watches, silent and still, as the Whitebeards rally around their father, opening a path in the crowd of marines for the older man to pass through.

He watches, silent and still, as the Roger Pirates follow the rallying cry.

He watches, silent and still, as Scopper Gaban leaves Rush and Riza to guard the Oro Jackson as he runs to join the charge, axe at the ready.

He watches, silent and still, as Marian and Elena stand back to back with one of Whitebeard’s lieutenant and Yadomaru

He watches, silent and still, as Seagull rushes forward alongside Diamond Jozu, as Gulliver fights side by side with Little Oars.

He watches, silent and still, as Crocus throws himself into the fray with what feels like glee, harpoons at the ready.

He watches, silent and still, as Rayleigh keeps Kizaru busy, distracting him from the charge.

( ~~He watches, silent and still, as the Roger Kaizoku go to war for Portgas D Ace in a way they never did for him.)~~

He watches and watches and watches, and he makes sure that the denden is watching too, because this needs to be witnessed by all.

Buggy watches, but he listens too, his ears floating discreetly on both sides of the battle.

He listens to Sengoku roaring orders, telling his men to brace themselves. He listens to Whitebeard’s people, to their rage on their brother’s behalf even when he just attempted to murder their father, and ignores the jealous twist of his stomach when confronted to that kind of loyalty.

(Did they ever have that? That kind of faith in each other, that kind of loyalty, of family? Or was it just Roger, holding them together by sheer charisma, that made the others tolerate him for a couple of years?)

* * *

 

The battlefield, and with it the entire island, shakes Buggy out of his thoughts. Quite literally, too. The whole island tilts to the side, and Buggy barely has the time to hold onto something as John Giant’s broken body passes him by.

Stupid Whitebeard, using his powers with no considerations for his newest allies who aren’t used to his monster bullshit. The denden nearly gets squashed by falling stone, and Buggy has to send his hand to move it to a safer location when buildings start to fall around him.

At least Whitebeard didn’t target the one Buggy is currently staying on, or Buggy would have pitched a fit. He has no plans whatsoever to reveal his presence at this stage, or at all if he can help it (which, with his luck, he won’t be able to but he’s trying very hard not to think about that right now thank you very much).

There’s so much dust and debris flying around that, for an instant, Buggy thinks Whitebeard might have succeeded in bring the platform down. But then the dust is blown away, and the three admirals are standing in front of it, hands raised, as they use their combined haki to shield it.

Roger would have managed that on his own, Buggy wants to say, but he keeps his mouth shut because that’s just a reminder that Roger didn’t even try, and Buggy will never forgive him for that.

That, and needing three people to do the job Roger had been able to do on his own does not mean that any of them are weak at all. Roger had been a monster even amongst the other monsters of his era. That did not mean that the others hadn’t been monsters in their own rights. There’s a reason Buggy has been staying the fuck away from the other big names of that era.

The fact that the admirals are bickering in the middle of a battlefield is just another proof that they are amongst the strongest people here and they  _ know it _ .

(Buggy is very much not part of that group. He knows that too, hence why he’s not going down there until he absolutely has to.)

Strawhat is also very much not part of that group...yet. There’s potential, definitely, and if given the chance to grow up the brat is going to be one hell of a monster. But right now? Right now the brat is so fucking out of his league that’s it’s ridiculous. Especially since the boy does not seem to realise it, leading the charge as he is, overconfidence rolling off him by the bucket. And none of his allies seem willing to point that out, for all that Jimbei is sticking close to him. Even Whitebeard just encouraged him, finding the brat’s stubbornness to be endearing no doubt.

Crocus is also sticking close to Strawhat, much closer than he did to Buggy when Buggy had been a  _ child _ that  _ couldn’t swim _ , and Buggy looks away before he allows himself to start thinking about that too much.

Which also means that he’s the first to spot the walls that rise to protect the plaza, preventing pirates from stepping foot on it.

Well, most of them. Some were already there, like Buggy himself, and he can hear Yadomaru swearing up a storm when she realises that her crew has been isolated and is now facing very, very unfavorable odds.

Eh. Buggy would still bet on the Blackjacks. They had been vicious buggers way back then, and something tells him that none of them are the kind to have mellowed with age. Odds are, the marines will end up regretting the day they decided to erase Rouge’s past as a pirate. As if that woman had ever been anything other than terrifying. The fact that she died in childbirth is just. So fucking unfair. She should have lived to raise her child and hell against anyone trying to harm the blood of her blood. She should have died with her head held high and a staff in her hand, after making Davy Jones beg for the privilege of escorting her to his locker. That she had to extend her pregnancy, that she was denied the option of medical help, is a heresy that Buggy will never forgive.

* * *

 

(You can be scared shitless of someone and still respect the fuck out of them.)

(Blackjack D Rouge was one of them.)

* * *

The wall is rising, except for two sections where Gulliver and Oars have been piling up Pacifista corpses, their not-voices fading one by one.

(Thank fuck. That had been disturbing to the highest degree.)

The irony of the Marine’s secret project literally being the cog in the machine that prevents the walls from rising completely is not lost on Buggy. He just wishes he was in a better position to enjoy it. This may be a complete clusterfuck, and things are definitely going to get worse because that’s just the kind of day this is shaping up to be, but he shouldn't let that stop him from enjoying the sight of the Marines getting their proper comeuppance. 

Then Sengoku the Asshole in Chief orders Akainu to destroy the ice the pirates in the bay are using as footing, and Buggy winces. With Akainu’s magma, even diving in the water won’t save them for long before they get boiled alive. And there’s definitely a couple of Devil Fruit users in that lot - the water won’t do them any good.

( _ Would you rather drown, or be burned alive? _ And no no no nonononononononono Buggy does not need to remember that right now, he can’t afford to, he never ever wants to remember that.)

(Three years on his own after getting separated from Shanks, and Buggy still doesn’t know how he survived. He knows he wouldn’t have if it weren’t for his fruit, though, and still can’t decide if that’s a good thing or not.)

(Edd war at ten, Raftel at twelve, Loguetown with Shanks at fourteen, adrift on his own at sixteen, Marineford at thirty seven and a whole lot of bullshit in between.)

(Blessing or curse?)

* * *

Buggy frowns, focuses his haki to the bay and smirks, unseen. Looks like Sengoku was not the only one who could make contingency plans.

The smirks disappear when Buggy realises that Akainu is not just aiming for the ice. He’s aiming for the  _ ships _ .

Fury rises in Buggy’s chest, and he doesn’t even try to contain it. While he no longer has any faith in the people he sailed with, Shanks excepted, that is not true of the ship he sailed on.

For all that he can’t think back to his time on her without flinching, the Oro Jackson still means  _ home _ . She had carried him, protected him, taught him, and while he will never admit it to anyone except possibly Shanks, he loves that ship dearly.

The Moby Dick goes up in flames, and Buggy winces, but keeps his eyes firmly on the Oro Jackson. Fuck. He does not want to interfere, but he does not want to lose her either, but there’s  _ nothing he can do _ and he wants to kill Akainu with his bare hands.

Buggy isn’t sure if the Moby has a Klabautermann, but he knows that the Oro does. He also knows that he’s probably the only one who’s ever met it, with the possible exception of Rush, late one night after the Edd War when nightmares had driven him out of his hammock and onto the deck.

(Oro had smiled at him from its faceless face, had let him stay close and watch as it repaired the ship Tom had built so carefully, and Buggy had fallen asleep to the sound of a falling hammer, and his sleep had been dreamless.)

Buggy does not want to lose Oro, or the ship, and he holds his breath as Rush performs evasive maneuvers after evasive maneuvers, directing the ship all by herself even though that shouldn’t be possible, and coats it in her own Armament Haki, the Adam wood glowing darkly, and that shouldn’t be possible either, but Buggy spots a small figure standing by the mast and lets out a breath of relief. The Oro Jackson would escape this, just as she had escaped from the Edd War without a scratch.

He had never needed that reminder to trust the ship Tom had built for them.

“Don’t you dare scratch  _ my fucking ship! _ ” said tiny shipwright roars, her voice easily heard even over the pained screams. “I’m going to tear you to shreds for what you did to the Moby! That ship was a fucking fine piece of craftsmanship! It was a work of  _ art,  _ you heathens!”

Buggy can’t prevent a small smile from blooming on his lips. Akainu better watch his back, because Rush looks ready to tear him apart with her bare hands. Such a small woman should not be that terrifying, but Rush had taken one look at the other monsters in the crew and had decided that she was going to be the scariest of them all. So far, she’s succeeding.

The Voices of the Shirohige are filled with grief as they watch their ship sink, but Akainu doesn’t allow them the time to grieve, pursuing them relentlessly until they have no choice but to chance the water. 

( _ Would you rather drown, or be burned alive?) _

Neither canons nor Whitebeard’s power seem to work against the wall, and the only way left into the plaza is through the pile of pacifistas that prevented the wall from rising up completely.

Which is going to leave them completely to the mercy of marine snipers. That path is a bottleneck, and the marines are already taking up positions on the other side, ready to slaughter any pirate that tries to make it through.

Of fucking course, Strawhat immediately has to prove that he lacks the survival instincts Davy Jones gave to fucking jellyfishes and rush through the opening.

How the hell can Shanks believe the brat will live long enough to become Pirate King? Scratch that, how the hell had the kid made it to the double digits when he regularly proves that he is too dumb to live? Had he been that reckless when Shanks had met him, or was it a side effect of being gifted Roger’s hat?

Fuck, but he actually feels bad for the brat’s crew. He knows exactly what it’s like to deal with a captain like that, and you couldn’t pay him enough to do that again. Once was more than enough, thank you very fucking much.

* * *

 

“Almost everything is going according to plan. We will now proceed with the execution of Portgas D. Ace!” Sengoku announces, and Buggy snorts. He’s pretty sure the Roger Kaizoku showing up was definitely not something the lauded strategist had predicted. Same for the Blackjacks. Both of their crews had been known for being unpredictable as fuck, back then.

(Mostly because not even the crew themselves had any idea what would happen from one day to the next, what with their captains being who they were.)

Strawhat gets thrown back towards the Okama emperor and Jimbei, and the later immediately sends him back in, only for the brat to find himself facing all three Admirals. By himself.

Lacking the preservation instincts Davy Jones gave jellyfishes, seriously. Shanks owes him  _ so much alcohol _ for this bullshit. And not the cheap bullshit either -  _ quality alcohol _ .

Thankfully, Strawhat’s survival is currently in the hands of people Buggy wants nothing to do with, but who will keep him alive for Shanks’ sake if nothing else, so Buggy can afford to look around and keep an eye on other things. Like Sengoku ordering the execution, the flaming chicken trying desperately to reach the platform, and the swords coming down towards FireFist while Strawhat terrified cry rings out across the battlefield.

Fuck. Buggy does not want to intervene, but this is Captain’s son and he doesn’t deserve to die like this no matter what kind of monster his father was, and Buggy readies himself, gathers Armament Haki in his lower body, prepares to blow his cover, and then Crocodile is there, moving too fast for Buggy to see him but he’s not trying to hide his haki, and the two executioners fall to the ground, dead or unconscious, and Buggy settles back, allows the armament to fade from his limbs, the shakes to leave his hands, the breathe to leave his lungs.

“You!” Sengoku rages. “Because of the grudge you hold against him, you are the last person we expected to assist Whitebeard! Crocodile!”

“I can finish the old geezer off later... but seeing you scum so cheerful makes me sick!” The Sand user spits, before losing his head.

Literally.

Why Doflamingo would think that would work on a logia without even trying to use haki on his strings, Buggy doesn’t know. Or maybe the Shichibukai is just playing around. That’s always a possibility, given what Buggy knows of the asshole.

But either way, the impromptu decapitation has no effect other that pissing Crocodile off, and Buggy happily leaves the two of them to it. Crocodile might have just saved Firefist’s life, but Buggy does not care enough about the man to worry about his survival.

Meanwhile, the Whitebeards are moving again, trying to reach the two giants playing dodgeballs with cannonballs, and by the time the marines stop gaping at Crocodile and Doflamingo, the smaller ship that Buggy had sensed before is surfacing, picking up the swimmers and paddling at full speed towards the giants. From there on it’s a simple matter of Oars and Gulliver picking the ship up and carrying it through the opening they’ve made, and suddenly there’s a shitton of Shirohige inside the plaza, much to Yadomaru’s relief if her screams of ‘You’re late!’ are anything to go by.

Crocus is on that ship, intent on joining Strawhat, and Buggy is quick to turn his sight somewhere else. He can’t afford to get distracted by his anger, not now.

He focuses on Whitebeard instead, watches as the strongest man on the seas blows away legions of marines with a single swing of his bisento.

“The time has finally come!” The man roars. “We're going to rescue Ace! And take out the whole Naval force!”

That’s a goal Buggy can get behind, and he fully plans on cheering the old man on from his hiding place, especially when Sengoku starts moving to challenge the Earth-shaker.

“Looks like this war... insists on the two of us participating!”

Buggy snorts. As if there had been any other possible outcome than this after Sengoku had ordered the execution of Portgas D. Ace. As if Whitebeard was the kind of man to let that kind of slight against one of his precious sons slide.

Really. And the guy is supposed to be a genius. Buggy has known since he turned seven that messing with Whitebeard’s people is the best way to earn someone a quick and painful death.

It looks like the marines have forgotten that, over the years.

Just because Whitebeard doesn’t fight much these days doesn’t mean he’s lost any of his strengths, as Aokiji discovers quickly when he stupidly tries to freeze an earthquake. Ice breaks just as easily as earth, if not more.

* * *

Buggy’s intuition is  _ screaming _ and he whirls around just in time to catch sight of Kizaru piercing Strawhat with his laser.

Fuck. Shanks is going to go berserk when he learns about this.

(Even that is not enough for the boy to lose consciousness. What the fuck is he made of, seriously? Rubber does not work like this! Blood loss should still affect the brat, as should concussions! He should not be trying to stand up and reach for his brother!)

(Survival instincts of a fucking jellyfish!)

(Fucking D’s. If the brat lives through this, Buggy is sicking Shanks on him. Maybe the Yonko will be able to pound some sense in Strawhat’s head. Buggy isn’t holding his breath, though.)

(The boy is too much like Captain Roger, always rushing headfirst into danger on a whim, especially when their precious people are on the line, but at least Roger had been strong enough to afford it.)

(Edd War at ten, and no, Buggy  _ does not need to think about this right now _ .)

(Since the execution, Buggy had wondered more than once if his captain had actually been suicidal. He had made it clear that he didn’t want to die on his sickbed, weak and in pain, and Buggy wonders how much of Roger’s recklessness was due to wanting to die in a burst of glory.)

(Sometimes, he wonders Loguetown was Roger realizing that if he continued to pursue Death like he had been doing, he was going to drag the entire crew down to Davy Jones locker along with him since they weren’t about to let him get himself killed on their watch.)

(He never told Shanks about his suspicions, but knows his friend thinks about it too.)

(Shanks hasn’t been fully sober in over twenty years.)

(If Buggy’s liver had the same resilience, if Buggy wasn’t terrified of not being in full control of his body and wits, Buggy would be the same.)

* * *

Kizaru kicks Strawhat straight into Whitebeard’s hands, who does the smart thing and immediately gives the brat to one of his doctors (not his personal one, though, Buggy notes. The Nightingale is not leaving her father’s side, and the pinched expression on her face makes him commiserate with her. He knows what it’s like to know that your captain is dying and that there’s nothing you can do to change it.)

“For the great Whitebeard to make such an error in judgment... the mighty have indeed fallen!” Kizaru mocks. “For a man of your stature to be so reckless... you let your emotions get the better of you when you allowed this pile of garbage to lead the charge…”

The admiral is so busy mocking a man who was already one of the strongest pirates in all the seas long before he was born that he doesn’t see the haki-darkened weapon coming before it collides with his face.

Crocus is  _ furious _ , Buggy notes detachedly. And so is Rayleigh, on whose sword Kizaru impales himself as he stumbles back from Crocus’ attack.

“That,” Rayleigh says calmly even as Kizaru tries to move away from the sword piercing his shoulder, “was a mistake, Borsalino.”

(They were never this angry on his behalf, Buggy thinks, even though he actually sailed with them for years, even though Rayleigh had been his teacher and Crocus his doctor, they had never stepped in like that to protect him unless they absolutely had to, and even then it had  _ always _ been followed with lectures about how he should never have allowed himself to get into such a situation in the first place or how he should have been strong enough to deal with it himself and Buggy thought he had managed to distanciate himself from them enough that such a reminder wouldn’t hurt so much but obviously that hadn’t worked and he needs to stop thinking about this because if he doesn’t he won’t make it through this bullshit alive and he refuses to die because of them.)

Buggy needs a fucking drink.

* * *

What he gets instead is someone trying to sneak up behind him. Gotta give the guy points - he had his Voice smothered down so tightly that Buggy probably wouldn’t have noticed it if he wasn’t using his Observation Haki so precisely to keep an eye on everything that’s happening around him - and to make sure no one could sneak up on him and stab him in the back.

“Man, this is such a clusterfuck…” Someone sighs from behind him, and Buggy is whirling around, knife in one hand and gun in the other, only to bring them down when he realizes who it is.

“Rockstar,” he greets Shanks most recent crewmember. “I could have killed you, you moron! What the hell does Shanks teach you guys, that you think it’s smart to sneak up on someone in a battle like this one?!”

What the hell is Rockstar doing here? Buggy can’t sense Shanks anywhere in the vicinity, and the redhead is  _ shit _ at hiding his presence, unlike Rockstar whose presence rarely rises over that of a mouse. Ironic, really, that the guy with such a showy nickname was actually the sneakiest of all the Akagami Kaizoku. Especially since, when he wasn’t actively trying to hide, Rockstar did actually live up to his nickname, making sure no one could overlook him. Red hair styled in huge spikes that stands out in a crowd, taller than most and with clothes in the unlikely combination of purple, orange, red, yellow and light blue that  _ really _ shouldn’t work as well as it does, and the green saber to top it up, no one would look at him and believe that this is Shanks best spy.

Is it any wonder that Buggy finds himself getting along with the man on the few occasion he and Shanks meet up?

The Akagami Kaizoku drops to sit next to him.

“Sorry,” he replies. “But you’re a hard man to find, Captain Buggy. I mean, Okashira did tell me that you were damn good at that, but jeez. It’s not often I find someone who can completely hide their presence like that. Hell, I can’t bring mine down that much yet.”

Buggy gestures at the battlefield in front of them.

“I think that’s reason enough to want to hide and hide well,” he snarks. “If anyone else finds me because of you, I’ll string you up by your balls, Shanks be damned. What do you want, brat?”

“Weeeell,” Rockstar drawls. “I was supposed to infiltrate Impel Down and see if you wanted me to get you out while the Red Force made a distraction. Took me  _ weeks _ to finally slip inside, and then Firefist got arrested and they raised their security even more, and then Shanks’ Anchor decided to fuck things up and the rest is history.”

Buggy startles.

“You were there to get me out?” He asks, trying to hide his disbelief.

“To offer you a way out if you wanted one,” Rockstar corrects. “Okashira didn’t want to overstep since he knows you don’t take well to that, but since it was Luffy’s fault that you got sent to the damn thing, Okashira figured he owed it to you to at least offer.”

“I got sent to fucking Impel Down because Smoker was pissed that he couldn’t arrest Strawhat and because Monkey Fucking D Garp took offence to me taking a shot at his grandson,” Buggy deflects, even as he tries to process what Rockstar is saying.

Shanks had sent one of his men to get him out of Impel Down. No, to ask if he  _ wanted _ help in getting out of Impel Down, because Shanks knows that Buggy hates charity, hates being indebted to someone, and doesn’t trust anyone to come for him if he’s in trouble.

(Anyone except Shanks himself, that is, though sometimes it seems that the redhead forgets it. But he cared enough to send one of his men, respected him enough to  _ ask _ if that was alright, and knew him well enough to send the most discreet of his men to extract him without anyone noticing, without painting a target on Buggy’s back.)

(Fuck but he misses Shanks. As soon as this mess is over with, Buggy is dragging him down to East Blue to get absolutely shitfaced.)

“What about my crew?” He asks, because he hasn’t been able to get any news from them while in Impel Down, and they’re  _ his _ , Davy Jones damn it, they’re his  _ responsibility _ and he had sworn that he would look after them  ~~ like he had wanted someone to look after him ~~ and he will never forgive himself if something happens to them.

“They’re safe,” Rockstar tells him, and Buggy can feel the weight fall from his shoulders. “They managed to get away after your arrest, and your first mate, Mohji, is the one who let Okashira know what happened when Okashira called your denden. They’re staying on one of our islands in East Blue for now, waiting for you.”

They’re safe. That’s all Buggy can hear right now. His men are  _ safe _ , they weren’t arrested and they are waiting for him. He hasn’t failed them. They still trust him.

Shanks has made sure his men are safe. Shanks remembered, Shanks knows how Buggy feels about his crew, how hard he tries to do right by them, and Shanks had stepped in to make s Buggy would have a crew to come back to ~~this time~~.

Buggy is getting Shanks the best sake he can find for this.

“Where’s that captain of yours now?” He asks instead, because he is not going to talk about  _ feelings _ with one of Shanks’ men.

“I haven’t managed to reach the Red Force yet, but from what I’ve overheard the Marines saying, they’re on their way here. They’ll be here in less than two hours. Apparently they had to kick Kaido’s ass first since the little shit thought he could make a move on Shirohige’s territory while the old man was busy dealing with this.”

Rockstar paused.

“He’s going to be so fucking pissed off when he sees this mess,” he sighed, watching as Crocus joined the team of medics tending to Strawhat, who has finally lost his battle against unconsciousness.

“Did you ever met the kid?” Buggy asks him, curious and because he needs to change the subject.

(Needs to stop wondering if Shanks knew about Firefist, if he knew about the others gathering here to save Captain’s boy, if he knew and didn’t tell Buggy.)

(Buggy doesn’t think so, not when Shanks sent Rockstar to Impel Down to get him out practically as soon as word got out that Buggy had been captured, if he’s reading Rockstar’s words correctly, not when Shanks made sure his crew would be okay.)

(But doubt is like a weed, and it’s hard to shake it even after all these years, even when he knows,  _ knows _ that Shanks would never betray him like this. But old hurts linger, even when he knows that Shanks wouldn’t do this to him.)

(Two years together on their own, and Baterilla in the middle of that, and they know they can count on each other to have their backs even when the rest of the world is hunting them, even when no one else will,  _ because this is exactly what happened after Captain Roger’s execution _ .)

“Firefist? Or Strawhat?” Rockstar asks, proving once again that he’s smarter than most people give him credit for.

“Either. Both.”

“Yes to the first, no to the second, I joined a few years after they left East Blue behind that time. But I’ve heard all the stories, of course. I did meet Firefist a few years back. He tracked us down to this winter island we were restocking at. Thought he was looking for a fight at first, but turns out he wanted to thank Okashira for saving Luffy back then. Was very polite about it too, bowing and proper manners and everything. I had no clue he was actually Roger’s son before today, though. Don’t think Okashira knew either. He kept track of Firefist after that meeting, but it was always more of a ‘look at what Anchor’s brother is doing’ thing than anything else.”

“Yeah. I had no clue either,” Buggy admitted. “Tested him a bit before he left East Blue, but didn’t realize who he was. He doesn’t look much like Roger. Takes after Rouge a bit more, but then again I had no idea Captain had somehow managed to convince Blackjack D Rouge that he was worth her time so I didn’t make the link either.”

Rockstar then cements his place as Buggy’s favourite Redhair pirate after Shanks and Benn (the man is the only one with  _ common sense _ on that crew and he’s been keeping Shanks alive for the past decade and a half without giving in and strangling his captain. Buggy is pretty sure the man is an actual saint and has made a point of sending him high quality cigars regularly) by very deliberately not pointing out that the rest of the Roger Kaizoku had obviously known for a while, if they had been able to mobilize that quickly without anyone noticing.

Buggy wonders if they called Shanks up too, and what he said.

~~ He doesn’t wonder if they would have called him, had he not been in Impel Down. He already knows the answer. ~~

* * *

 

“Not going to intervene?” Buggy asks, nodding to where the doctors are working on Strawhat.

Rockstar shoots him a dry look.

“And get involved in that mess? No thank you, I know better than to interrupt doctors when they’re working. I like my life, thanks. Besides, I’m not sure how well old man Whitebeard would take someone else butting in on his rescue attempt, especially after Okashira tried to warn him that letting Firefist go after Blackbeard was a really fucking bad idea.”

“Didn’t listen, did he?”

“Thought he knew better than ‘Roger’s brat’,” Rockstar snorts. “Was an arsehole about it, too. Called Okashira a ‘snivelling kid’ and a fool. He didn’t want our help back then, he can do without it now. I’ll step in if I absolutely have to, if Firefist of Strawhat look like they’ll die without my intervention, but otherwise I’m staying the fuck out of it and taking notes so Okashira can decide who he’s going to kill when he gets here.”

Buggy stares.

“What?”

“I’m not used to seeing someone other than Benn actually demonstrate common sense when it comes to your crew,” Buggy points out.

Rockstar laughs.

“Don’t go giving out my secrets now,” he teased. “It’s easier when people underestimate you, after all.”

And insightful on top of that. Shanks truly does know how to choose them, doesn’t he?

“Well, it’s your turn to keep an eye on the brat then. This is the last time I agree to babysit him. I swear, Shanks owes me so much sake for this bullshit…” Buggy grumbled.

Next to him, Rockstar laughs.

“You and me both,” he agrees. “Something tells me that no matter what else happens today, the hangover will be  _ epic. _ ”


	8. Oh ! Hisse …  Hé oh  Miséricorde  Pour nous tenir au bout d’une corde  Faudra d’abord nous attraper  Faudra d’abord nous aborder Ho-hisse-ho ! Pavillon noir ! Ho-hisse-ho ! Pavillon haut !

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Whitebeard has stopped, his entire frame shaking, and there’s blood on his lips and the Nightingale by his side, and Akainu rushing towards them, and the Phoenix is distracted just long enough for Aokiji to hit him and-
> 
> A haki covered wrench flies through the air and hits Akainu exactly between the eyes.
> 
> For a second, everything seems frozen. Akainu’s eyes are crossed, as if trying to comprehend what just happened, and then, as if in slow-motion, he falls back, hitting the ground, hard.
> 
> “THAT WAS FOR THE MOBY DICK YOU ASSHOLE!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaand here's the promised Crocus chapter, where Crocus FINALLY gets to yell at people for disregarding medical advice. And to yell at Ivankov. For... a lot of reasons.
> 
> It's slightly later than expected, partly because of Life Happening, and partly because Crocus was being crochety and very uncooperative.
> 
> Oh yeah, and because SOMEONE prompted me about Buggy meeting Ace earlier in this verse and that spawned nearly ten thousand words of FEELS and Bitter!Buggy and Bitter!Shanks and awesome Buggy and Shanks friendship and I regret nothing and I may or may not be halfway through writing the third part of that thing. So. Yeah. Don't know when that will be out, and I haven't even started Buggy's next chapter yet, so no idea when that will be ready - I'll try and get something out before New Year, but with all the family gatherings and a planned trip to Paris to celebrate New Year with friends I haven't seen in months... I make no promises.
> 
> Also it may or may not be five in the morning here, but I was up late knitting slippers for my grandma's Christmas present and figured I might as well post this now. Let me know what you thinK! Your comments are the highlights of my days (even if people look at me weirdly when I suddenly burst into smiles for no apparent reason xD), you guys are the best and I'm so freaking happy that people are enjoying this verse and my version of Buggy!
> 
> Title is from Edith Piaf's "Le chant du pirate"

__Ho-hisse et Ho ! Miséricorde !  
Pour nous tenir au bout d'une corde,  
Faudra d'abord nous attraper,  
Faudra d'abord nous aborder...  
Ho-hisse-ho ! Pavillon noir !  
Ho-hisse-ho ! Pavillon haut !

_ (Le chant du Pirate, Edith Piaf) _

__Ho-hisse and ho! Mercy!  
To see us hanged  
One must first catch us,  
One must first board us...  
Ho-hisse-ho! The black flag!  
Ho-hisse-ho! The flag raised high!

* * *

 

Crocus is busy trying to heal Shanks’ brat, but that doesn’t mean he’s not keeping up with what is happening around him. A good doctor has to be able to multitask, after all. You’re no good to your patient if you take a stray bullet to the head because you weren’t paying attention.

So. Crocus is busy, but he’s still keeping track of what’s happening around him and, especially, around Ace. He chances a glance towards the platform long enough to see Garp punt the Phoenix away when he tries to free Ace, and very deliberately keeps the swearing that wants to break out for himself. His patient doesn’t need to hear him turn the air blue right now, no matter how much he would like to.

Captain entrusted his kid to Garp, trusted him with Rouge’s location and Ace’s entire existence, and the man proclaimed himself Ace’s grandfather and yet here he is, standing between Ace and those who want to save him, between Ace and freedom, between Ace and  _ life _ and he still has the galls to boast.

Crocus wants to make him very, very dead. In a very, very painful manner. He might even let Phoenix help, because the zoan is glaring at Garp the way he used to glare at Roger before he got  _ creative _ and Crocus very much wants to aim that creativity at a deserving target.

Sadly, his patient takes priority, so he focuses on that and listens to the chaos around him even as he bandages Strawhat.

The kid is in bad shape, no kidding about it. Ivankov’s hormones have wreaked havoc on his body, and he did himself no favour whatsoever by challenging the admirals. 

Even unconscious, though, the brat is still weakly trying to fight him off, to get to his brother, and really, Crocus admires his dedication, he  _ does _ , but he also has no qualms whatsoever turning the boy in a mummy to keep him from bleeding out.

(There’s a seastone tipped needle by his side, filled with the strongest sedative Crocus could get his hands on, ready to be used if necessary. Better safe than sorry, and Crocus will  _ not _ let his patient out in the fight again if he can help it.)

(He has the good drugs on his side. He can help it.)

* * *

 

Whitebeard is trying to motivate his troops, whose moral took a step back when Garp decided to step up, but is soon busy fighting against Akainu.

Crocus hopes Whitebeard will get rid of the bastard. If Rush gets her hands on him, it’s going to get  _ messy _ and Crocus very much does not want to deal with that.

To Crocus’s left, Rayleigh is quickly and efficiently putting Kizaru through the wringer. The admiral, already sporting a nice big hole in his chest from where Crocus pushed him on top of Rayleigh’s sword, is now missing an arm and limping heavily. Blood loss alone will have him dead in fifteen minutes unless they have a healing devil user on staff that can get to him on time.

Which they won’t, because Kizaru had wandered too far from his fellow marines and no one would risk such a valuable devil fruit user getting killed in a battlefield like this one.

Plus, there’s that nice little poison Crocus had coated that particular harpoon with. Asshole is not getting out of this alive, even if he manages to get away from Rayleigh, which looks more than unlikely given how pissed off the old man is.

Crocus quickly sews one of Strawhat’s numerous wounds shut, grateful once again that he brought the seastone kit with him. It hadn’t been needed often, back in the days, what with only Buggy having eaten a fruit and his ability making him basically immune to cuts, but Crocus believed in being over prepared and had made sure to have one on board no matter how much Elena had bitched at the cost. He’d grabbed it when he left the Twin Peaks, thinking it might be useful in case Ace had gotten injured and couldn’t flame it away, but now he’s grateful he had. Normal needles would have done fuck all when confronted with Strawhat’s rubber skin.

Speaking of Captain’s son.

On the platform, Ace’s emotions are rollercoasting all over the place, which is never a good sign, especially when it comes to flaming young men barely out of their hormonally challenging teenage years with severe self-worth issues.

Crocus is too far to hear what’s being said on the platform, but whatever it is, even Sengoku seems stricken by it.

Good. Crocus would very much like to strike Sengoku in the  _ face _ , but he’ll settle for someone else emotionally punching him in the guts, as long as physical punching happens soon enough. Or kicking. Or stabbing. He's not picky.

* * *

Crocus’ hand shoots out, scalpel glowing darkly with haki leaving a thin red line across Ivankov’s hands.

“Ivankov, if you touch the boy I will kill you myself.”

“I’m trying to help!” The Okama protests, and Crocus silences him with a glare.

“You’re trying to kill him, more like! If you inject any more of your ‘miracle cure’ into this boy,  _ he. will. die _ . No if or buts about it. His body is at its limits, he’s bleeding out from far too many wounds, and he’s still recovering from your violent purge of the poison in his body.  _ Residues of that poison might still be in his bloodstream.  _ Any change in his blood chemistry right now might set it off again, stronger than before. I’ve said this before and I will say it again:  _ You are not a medical practitioner _ . You have no idea what the fuck you’re doing. You play God with people’s bodies without their consent, when you have never studied medicine or what exactly your fruit actually does. You  _ will _ stay away from my patient or I will  _ end you _ , not matter what Dragon has to say about it.  _ Are we clear? _ ”

“Need... to save… Ace…” Crocus’ patient opens his eyes weakly, grabbing for his arm. “Need… the miracle cure…”

“You need a new fucking brain” Crocus tells him. “You are in no way knowledgeable enough about medicine to know what you’re asking for. Do you want your brother to have your death on his conscience? Because the way you’re acting, that’s what’s going to happen!“

Strawhat freezes at that, and Crocus has no compunctions whatsoever about using that lapse to continue stitching him up. Without anaesthetics, because they're in the middle of a battlefield and the moron was fighting as if he couldn’t register the pain anyway.

“But… Ace…” Luffy croaks out.

Crocus sighs. Davy Jones save him from idealist, naive idiots.

“Ace has people looking out for him, people who are not already on Davy Jones’ doorstep. Do you want your brother to be saved or do you want to kill yourself trying and fail to save him, and probably get him killed in the fallout? Because that’s the only way you attempting anything in the state you’re in will end, brat. You’ll only be a distraction to the people who can actually do something. Have some faith in your brother’s nakama. Whitebeard’s the most annoying, honorable bastard on all the seas, and his brood are just like him, that third grade reject Teach excepted. And the Blackjacks have a vested interest in keeping him safe as well, because his mother was their captain. And we old timers may have told Newgate that we would be leaving the rescue to him, we’re still going to step in if it looks like they won’t get there in time. But we won’t be able to do that if we have to worry about you getting yourself killed, so stay fucking put! Davy Jones, but I pity your medic. Fucking D’s I swear!”

Luffy looks like he’s been sucker punched (which, admittedly, he has been, multiple times, just not by Crocus) and any other time Crocus might feel bad about putting that expression on the face of a usually happy go lucky person, but right now he doesn’t give a damn. The sooner the brat realises that throwing his life away without stopping to think about the consequences (or, hell, that consequences are a thing, period!), the better.

“Look, kid,” Crocus tries, gentler this time. “We’re not going to let anything happen to Ace if we can’t help it, but how do you think he would feel if you got yourself killed trying to save him? Hell, how do you think he feels right now, knowing how much you’ve just been hurt?”

He pauses.

“You made a promise to Laboon, brat. Do not make me have to tell him that you won’t be coming back for him either.”

Luffy doesn’t reply, and Crocus cuts the thread he used to stitch up his shoulder. He’s about to start on one of the brat’s other wounds (he’s got plenty to choose from) when he hears a loud rattle from behind him.

* * *

_ Coughing, blood in the lungs what the hell - _

* * *

Whitebeard has stopped, his entire frame shaking, and there’s blood on his lips and the Nightingale by his side, and Akainu rushing towards them, and the Phoenix is distracted just long enough for Aokiji to hit him and-

A haki covered wrench flies through the air and hits Akainu exactly between the eyes.

For a second, everything seems frozen. Akainu’s eyes are crossed, as if trying to comprehend what just happened, and then, as if in slow-motion, he falls back, hitting the ground, hard.

“THAT WAS FOR THE MOBY DICK YOU ASSHOLE!”

Rush is standing on the Oro Jackson’s deck, arm still extended from where she threw the wrench. In the crow’s nest, Riza’s shots keep Aokiji away from the phoenix long enough for Marco to regain his bearings and avoid the seastone restraints that had been heading his way.

“Oyaji!” “Old man!”

Whitebeard looks like he’s about to protest Rush’s involvement, but her declaration that this was revenge for the Moby Dick stops him in his track. Hard to protest people butting into his fight when they were actually avenging his ship  Next to him, the Nightingale nods in the Oro Jackson’s direction. She looks like she would like nothing more than to stomp off towards the fallen admiral and kill him with her bare hands, but her patient takes precedence.

Crocus knows the feeling. He just hopes someone will make sure the magma bastard is actually dead and not just knocked out. He would do it himself if he could, but he also has a patient that takes precedence.

Fucking D’s.

“KEEP YOUR DISTANCE!” Whitebeard bellows when it looks like his men want to rush to him, despite the marines honing in on his perceived weakness. “They think that something so insignificant ! I do not need assistance! I can hold out a bit longer! I am Whitebeard! My death... it's significance is not lost on me. And I am well aware of just what that would entail! That is why... that is the very reason why I cannot die just yet! Not until I can secure the future of my sons with these very hands! Isn't that right, Ace?”

Newgate’s words leave a bitter taste in Crocus’ mouth. From the look on her face, it’s the same for the Nightingale. And for the rest of Whitebeard’s kids, given the way the commanders gather at his back.

“What formation are those pirates taking up behind Whitebeard?” Some random marine asks loudly.

Crocus snorts. How can someone not understand ? The Shirohige are protecting their father’s back, and with it his honour and his name, as the short commander, Haruta, is quick to point out.

“Its meaning is beyond the likes of you! We're defending the name of our father!”

Seventy odd years old, over fifty of those spent on the seas, most of them during the first great era - and yet Newgates does not sport a single scar on his back that is not an exit wound. He has never run from a fight, never turned his back to his enemy and have them actually hit him - not when his children have  _ always _ stood between their father and whoever tried to kill him from behind.

“My foolish children!”

As if Newgate is really surprised by their actions, Crocus snorts. He's the one who 'raised’ them, he only has himself to blame, seriously. He just stormed Marineford to save one of his sons - and yet he's surprised that they would try and save him? Moron.

“You say you cannot perish until you secure the future of your children?” Sengoku roars over the noise. “I shall show you their future right here and now! Whitebeard!”

* * *

At some point during the past half an hour, the executioners around Ace have been replaced without Crocus noticing, and he swears a blue streak when he notices their raised swords. Rayleigh is running, having disposed of Kizaru, and Marco the phoenix takes to the air, but there’s no way they’ll make it in time and fuck, Crocus does not want to be proven a liar just minutes after having pointed out that nothing would happen to Ace!

“Watch closely, Whitebeard!”

“STOP IT ALREADY!” Crocus’ patient  _ screams _ , and a wave of power rushes across the battlefield, knocking out the more weak-willed marines, just as multiple bullets impact the two executioners.

King’s haki. The kid has fucking King’s Haki. Fuck. No wonder Rayleigh got attached. A D. with that haki? And completely untrained? Fuck, but Garp has so much explaining to do for not making sure the kid could at the very least use the other two!

Fuck. There’s an untrained D. with King’s Haki roaming around the seas. No wonder the past few months have been weird as fuck. He should have guessed, really, after Enies Lobby.

Fucking D’s, seriously.

Without turning around, Crocus knows Riza was one of the shooters, just as he knows that the Blackjack’s sharpshooter, Kuukaku, was the one who aimed for both men’s crotches while her brother hit the one on the left with a cannon ball.

Subtlety, thy name has never been Blackjack.

* * *

“Now that vas something!” Ivankov enthuses, and Crocus feels no remorse whatsoever for literally kicking him away. He has enough on his hands trying to get his patient to lie back down when said patient has apparently forgotten everything Crocus just told him and is struggling to stand up.

“Now I’m coming to save you!” The boy screams, and Crocus swears.

Time for the good drugs it is. Crocus reaches for the syringe, but by the time his hand closes around it Luffy is  _ gone _ and  _ Crocus is going to kill him _ .

He shouldn’t even have been able to move so much as a fucking  _ finger! _ Let alone run off in the middle of the closest thing to a war this decade has ever seen! The only reason the kid hasn’t been killed yet is because half the marines are out cold from the brat’s Haki wave and the others are still shellshocked.

FUCKING D’S!

* * *

“Go for Whitebeard first!” Someone shouts from the marine’s side as they finally start moving. “He's a monster, so don't take him lightly! Do whatever you can to take him down!”

By Whitebeard’s side, the Nightingale straightens.

“Over my dead body!” She hisses, twirling her scalpels.

“Men!” Whitebeard shouts. “Use all you’ve got to back up Strawhat!”

“OH HELL NO!” Crocus _screams_ at Newgate. “The kid is in no state to do anything but collapse right now! You want to help him, you get him back here  _ right this fucking second!” _

Apparently, at least one of the Shirohige has some sense, or feels like he owes the Rogers because of Rush’s earlier actions, because the Phoenix suddenly changes target and grabs Strawhat in his claws. Seconds later, the zoan is gently dropping the struggling teenager in front of Crocus before rushing off towards the platform. This is the second time the proper ceremonial beheading has been prevented. Any moment now, Sengoku will say to hell with procedure and ceremony and kill Ace himself if this goes on any longer, and no one wants to take the risk. Crocus doesn’t even have to look to know that Ace is the Phoenix’s next target.

Crocus takes one look at his newly delivered patient who’s  _ still _ struggling to get back to the fight and stabs him with the needle. There. At least now he’ll stop trying to get himself killed before Crocus can finish healing him!

His patient finally sedated, Crocus can finally afford to take a look at what’s happening around the plaza. Most of the marines (and some of the weaker willed pirates) are on the ground, frothing at the mouth, unconscious from their first clash with King’s Haki.

Hu. That shouldn’t have felled so many of them. Had the standards for marines fallen that much? Or had they just thrown together a bunch of wet behind the ears newbies to bulk up their numbers and have some cannon fodder at hand? Both were equally possible, honestly.

Roban is sticking close to the edge of the plaza, where he has plenty of water at his disposal to make sure no one comes too close to the Oro Jackson.

(Not that anyone is even attempting to come closer. Apparently, Rush’s glares are more than enough to dissuade them. The shipwright is going to be gloating for  _ weeks _ after that.) 

Riza is still taking potshots at whoever looks like they’re trying to make things difficult for the pirates, and from the way she’s calling out numbers, Crocus has an inkling that she and Kukaku have resumed their usual competition.

Seagull and Scopper are somewhere in the middle of the fray, and sound perfectly happy to be there, so Crocus moves on to Gulliver… who has taken to using the last Pacifista corpse as an overgrown bat to hit people with. It’s working, so Crocus leaves him at it.

Clearly, it’s been too long since any of them have had a proper fight, so it’s only natural that they get some fun.

Marian is playing around with Hina, and Crocus will _not_ get involved there, thank you very much. Let the ladies have their fun, he’ll stay out of it.  Elena has managed to make her way across the platform, and is actually sticking pretty close to Crocus, her Jacob staff breaking bones left and right - good, he might need help getting the brat out of this mess, especially since Jimbei still looks shell shocked and Crocus is not letting Ivankov so much as touch his patient ever again.

Rayleigh is still heading for the platform, for Sengoku who looks  _ this _ close to going full Buddha on them, and Crocus wishes him good luck with that.

Kizaru down, it’s easier for the Phoenix to make his way to Ace unimpeded (dodging a few cannon balls and letting non-seastone bullets pass through his body harmlessly does not count as a hardship in Crocus's eyes, not when the man is currently pretending to be a flaming chicken), though Monkey D Garp still stands in his way.

Has Crocus mentioned already that he dearly wishes he could kill the man himself? Because he does. He really,  _ really _ does.

* * *

“I won't move” Garps proclaims, loud enough for all to hear. “I am the vice-admiral of the marine headquarters! Since long before most of you were ever born, I've been fighting with pirates! If you want to get through here, you'll have to do so after killing me! That's the path you have chos- urk!”

Revenge is  _ sweet _ and it comes in the form of a tall, dark haired women with a bo-staff Crocus recognises as Rouge’s. Revenge from beyond the grave for what her son went through because of Garp - Crocus can appreciate this fine bit of poetic justice, especially when it nails Monkey D Garp straight in the crotch. The pain filled shriek that resounds over the battlefield is music to his ears. At least it’s unlikely that any of them will have to worry about the old marine siring another child ever again - three Monkey D is already three too many. And it’s not even his birthday! He’ll have to make sure to do something nice for Yadomaru after this - is smutty literature still the best way to show her his appreciation?

Next to him, Elena throws her head back and laughs.

“I am sooo taking Lisa out for drinks for that!” She says with glee, punting away a marine that had been getting slightly too close for her taste. “Hell, I’m so taking her to  _ bed _ for that if she’s willing. That was  _ hot _ !”

“TMI, ‘lena. TMI,” Crocus protests.

She snorts.

“Doc, you’ve seen us all naked and in compromising positions more than once, you can deal. I may be old, but I still have eyes!”

“If you’re old, what am I then?” He grumbles, because Elena is barely pushing forty-five, whereas he is on the wrong side of seventy.

“Positively ancient!” She replies without pause, a beaming smile on her face and, okay, he had set himself up for that one.

“Youths those days, no respect for their elders!” He complains half-heartedly. “Make yourself useful then, you upstart! Get this moron to the Oro Jackson and shackle him to a bed in the infirmary - I’m pretty sure we still have some seastone shackles somewhere. I’m not taking any risks with this brat. I do  _ not  _  want to deal with Shanks’ whinging if he dies on us, and you’ve seen the boss - Rayleigh’s gotten  _ attached _ . I am not dealing with that either. Anything happens to the brat between here and whenever we’re off this rock, it’s on you, capisce?”

“That’s a low blow, Doc!” Elena protests, but she carefully picks up the boy anyway. “Oi! Jimbei! Snap out of it and make sure we don’t get attacked on our way out!”

Thankfully, the fishman manages to shake himself out of his shock and dutifully follows the Oro Jackson’s navigator as she takes off. Good. That’s one patient off his hands. Now he needs to be ready for a new one, because Ace still isn’t off that damn platform despite the phoenix being there already. In Marco’s defence, he’s also fighting against a pretty pissed off Sengoku, but really. This should not be taking that long.

Crocus sighs, and starts making his way towards the platform. Best to be close by when things start going to shit again. They’ve been going too well in the pirates’ favour - something is bound to snap soon.

* * *

He has to bat away a few marines who think that because he’s old and a medic he’s an easy target (which, rude much? He’s the one who clubbed Kizaru across the face with a harpoon, and he’s a Roger Kaizoku! What exactly about him screams ‘weak’?) but doesn’t stop until he’s close enough to hear what’s happening on the platform.

“Hold on Ace, we’ll get you out of here!” the Phoenix is saying even as he has to dodge Sengoku’s fist.

“He’ll be executed by my hands!” Said Marine commander counters, and proceeds to triple size as he goes full Buddha.

Aw fuck.

See? This is why they can't have nice things. As soon as they do, the marines try to take them away or break them.

Crocus had predicted that Sengoku would have to try and get rid of Ace himself at this rate. He had also predicted that things would start taking a turn for the worse again, and you can’t exactly get much worse than a taste of Sengoku’s full Buddha mode to the head, as the Phoenix narrowly avoids finding out.

“SENGOKU!” Whitebeard calls out to the Marine Commander. “Leave my sons alone!”

Yeah. As if that’s going to work. It does distract Sengoku for a fraction of a second, which is enough for Rayleigh to finally get his ass on the platform and catch Sengoku’s next punch with the flat of his sword, so it's not  _ completely _ useless at least.

“We still have a fight to finish, I believe,” The Roger’s first mate smiles politely at Sengoku. “I’ve been waiting for over twenty years to finish that particular spar - surely you won’t begrudge an old man his pleasure,  _ won’t you _ ?”

Crocus winces. Shit. Rayleigh is definitely in a mood. That’s going to be a pain to deal with later, if he doesn’t manage to get it out of his system. Crocus would usually pity Sengoku, but right now he’s of the opinion that the marine deserves whatever is coming his way. Bastard shouldn’t have targeted their captain’s son.

* * *

(Fuck, but Crocus misses his captain. Roger had been the epitome of a D, reckless and foolish and crazy, but he had been his captain and Crocus had followed him proudly, had worn his colours and stood beside him when they reached Raftel and he had never been more certain that his place had been there, on that ship, with that crew, with that man as his captain.)

(Had never felt more useless when attempt after attempt at a cure had failed, when Roger had started losing weight and coughing up blood, until the day Roger told him to  _ stop trying _ . Until the day Roger had gathered the crew and told them that this was the end of the line, this was as far as they would go together. That he had only so much time left and that there was someone else he wanted to spend it with.)

(Until the day he stood on a roof in Loguetown and watched his captain taunt the world one last time before his head hit the ground. Until the day he couldn’t even give his captain the burial at sea that he had deserved.)

(Fuck, but Crocus misses Gol D. Roger and he will be damned if he has to watch his captain’s son die before his eyes. Not again. Not this time.)

* * *

Crocus heaves himself up on the platform while Rayleigh keeps Sengoku busy, and makes a beeline for Ace. The Phoenix is there too, back to human form and struggling with the chains.

“What’s the problem?” Crocus asks, because those restraints should have fallen off by now. “Hey, I’m just here to assist, remember?” he adds when Ace glares at him. “Leaving the rescue to the Shirohige, just as promised, but I also promised your moron of a brother that I wouldn’t let you die so deal with it.”

“Seastone chains!” The phoenix spits, just as Ace rushes out “Is Luffy okay?”

“No, but he will be as long as he doesn’t injure himself further and actually lets me do my fucking job,” Crocus says bluntly. “I’ve sedated him so he would stop trying to get himself killed by doing dumb things like charging headfirst into an admiral when he’s bleeding out like a stuck pig. I swear that kid has no self preservation instincts - and neither do you, by the way. How the hell did the two of you make it for so long without getting yourself killed?”

“Hey!” Ace protests.

“Kid, you were asking us to leave so they could execute you. Not exactly shining with self preservation instincts here,” Crocus snorts, coating his scalpel in haki and testing the chains himself. “Hu. These are high quality ones,” he admits when the blade comes away without leaving a scratch. And I don’t suppose anyone has the key?”

“That would be too easy,” Marco the Phoenix grimaces. “And they’re anchored to the platform too.”

Crocus looks over the battlefield, finds the people he’s looking for and turns back to Marco.

“Then we take the platform with us,” He declares. “Get that swordsman of yours, and the diamond guy too, and get them to cut away the platform where the restraints are anchored. You’ll just have to take them with you until you can cut them away.”

They state at him in disbelief.

“What?” Crocus asks, annoyed. “Do I have something on my face?”

Marco sighs.

“Do you need new glasses that badly, old man? The whole platform is resting on a seastone pillar, and the shackles are built in the bloody thing! We need the bloody key!”

Crocus draws himself up, because he's not going to let Whitebeard's brat dismiss him like that, he's  _ not _ ! But before he can there's a huge sigh from behind them.

“Davy Jones be my witness, you guys are  _ useless _ .” Someone complains behind Crocus, who whirls around in surprise.

There's a young man standing behind him, in his early thirties at most, with bright red hair arranged in spikes. He looks familiar, though Crocus can't place him.

And he's twirling a set of keys in his fingers.

Ace and Marco, however, have no trouble recognising him.

“Rockstar?!” Ace gapes while the Phoenix winces. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“Oh sorry, is this a private party? Am I butting in?” Rockstar - and what kind of name was  _ that _ , seriously? - mocks. “What a way to greet an ally.”

“Your captain's last visit wasn't exactly peaceful”, Phoenix points out, eyeing him warily. “You can't blame us for being surprised, especially since you seem to be here on your own.”

The newcomer laughs.

“Geez, I wonder why. Was that the time when Okashira came to warn you to call Firefist back because Teach is an asshole that was up to something? The time when  _ your captain _ called him a fool and an upstart and told him to get lost? You guys are so lucky Okashira doesn't hold grudges when it comes to personal insults. Sadly for you, he does hold grudges when you get someone he cares about hurt  _ because you're too damn prideful to listen _ . And since Firefist has made it on the list on account of being an interesting person who managed to keep Okashira's protégé alive for seven years, which, given what I've seen today, is a fucking miracle… yeah. You're lucky Okashira still decided to step in when Kaido decided to be a brat and try for your territory.  _ You're welcome _ .” He adds, crouching next to Ace.

Okashira's protégé…

“You're one of Shanks’ men?” Crocus realises.

“Congrats on having eyes, though I can't say the same for your memory if it took you that long to recognise me,” Rockstar smirks even as he twists the key in the first lock. “You okay there, brat?”

For his part, Ace looks flabbergasted.

“What the hell, Rockstar?”

“What? Did you really think Okashira would let something happen to Anchor's brother? You're the kid's family, and the kid is family to us, ergo you are family to us as well. Deal with it.”

And it’s weird, how Rockstar keeps referring to Ace in regards to Strawhat, never to Roger, even though Shanks is one of them, has also sailed under Roger’s banner. Why would one of Shanks’ men not acknowledge that? Didn’t Shanks tell them  _ anything _ ?

“Though to be fair,” The redhead continues, “I wasn't even here for you to start with. I had something to do in Impel Down, and then Strawhat decided to storm it and here I am. I was going to let the Shirohige take care of it, since they'd made it clear that our help wasn't wanted, but since that lot would rather argue all day than, I don't know, check your brother's pocket for the key Hancock gave him earlier, _someone_ had to be the adult here.”

Crocus draws himself up, incensed. How dare that brat…

“Shut up, you,” Phoenix tells him without even looking at him. “He's right. This is not the time for bickering. And Rockstar? My thanks. To be conveyed to your captain in case I don't see him today.”

“Oh, he should be here soon,” Rockstar smirks even as he twists the last lock and takes a step back. “Kicked Kaido's ass and now he's on his way here. That will be fun.”

“Any other people going to show up when I never asked them to?” Ace grouses.

“Your pals from Wano probably won’t be able to make it in time,” Rockstar responds glibly, but the restraints are loose now and as Ace stands up they fall to the ground.

In a matter of seconds, an inferno stands in Ace's place as the flames that had been restrained for so long finally break free.

There's movement from within the flames, and suddenly they shoot up in the air to form the Shirohige Jolly Roger.

“I'm back in business!” Ace grins as the flames fade from his body.

“You're a menace, that's what you are,” Phoenix tells him, and before anyone can react, Whitebeard's first commander transforms, grabs Ace in his claws and makes for their father.

How rude! Crocus wants to yell, especially when he turns around and sees that the Rockstar kid has left too. He's going to have words with Shanks about that one! No respect for his elders!

(And if Crocus forgets that he has never had any respect for his own elders, well. No one has called him out on it in twenty years.)

He turns his attention back to the battlefield just in time for everything to go to Hell.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I am that evil :P
> 
> Happy holidays everyone <3 And a very happy new year if I don't manage to post anything before then!


	9. Prends le large mon gars / C'est le vent qui t'appelle / Prends le large mon gars / Il est temps de partir

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He winces when he caught sense of Portgas’ Voice. The boy is a Mess with capital M, radiating guilt and self-loathing and disbelief and Buggy wants to punch someone. He doesn’t even know the kid, has only met him that one time way back then when the brat had only just started and Buggy had decided to test his resolve, but no one should be made to feel like that. And it’s not because he’s captain’s son (or, at least, not just because of that), Buggy is aware that the kid doesn’t consider Roger his father for very valid reasons, and it’s not because he’s Rouge’s son either (even if the very idea of someone being of that menace’s bloodline having so much trouble believing that they are worth something seems impossible), and it’s not even because he’s one of Whitebeard’s.
> 
> It’s because, twenty one or not, Portgas D. Ace is just a fucking kid. And that kind of internalised self-hatred? That takes years to build up to those levels. Which means that this has been happening for a long time. And Buggy is an asshole, and a coward, and a thief and many a thing beside, but he will never, ever put a child through what’s he’s been through if he can help it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And it's out! Warning for feels, as usual.  
> I appologise in advance if there's some formatting issues, I'll try to fix them up this week-end, but I really wanted to get this out today.  
> Sorry if this took a while, I've started a new job on Monday and I'm trying to get back into a normal sleep cycle while also being exhausted every day so there hasn't been much time for writing recently.
> 
> Do let me know what you think of this chapter, it definitely felt good coming back to Buggy's POV!

Prends le large mon gars  
C'est le vent qui t'appelle  
Prends le large mon gars  
Il est temps de partir  
Prends le large mon gars  
C'est le vent qui t'appelle  
Eho ! Les gars, au vent de la mer  
Eho ! Les gars chantant

(Prends le large mon gars)

* * *

 

 

Buggy really, really wishes he had some booze on hand. Because this, this entire thing, is just one huge fucking mess. It’s going to take him weeks to make heads or tails of what happens here, and he’s a first hand witness!

Thankfully, Rockstar has taken over Strawhat’s babysitting, and thus Buggy can focus more on what’s happening around the battlefield and on the platform.

Garp is being his usual asshole self, he notes, sending Marco the Phoenix flying with one hell of a punch.

Buggy really, really wants to kill the man. He’s got a shit-load of reasons, too, and no jury of his peers would condemn him for it. Impel Down alone would be enough, but Buggy has never forgiven the man for being the one to bring Roger in, even knowing that Roger basically handed himself over. Especially knowing that Roger basically handed himself over. And now, learning that the marine had not only kept Roger’s son away from the Roger Kaizoku (which, honestly, was probably warranted, the Roger Kaizoku should  _ never ever _ be left in charge of children ever again), but then had the galls to raise the boy as his grandson (or, more likely, have the boy be raised by someone else and drop by every so often to play grandpa), to try and turn the boy into a  _ marine _ of all things, and then not stand up for the kid’s life.

Family is  _ commitment _ , especially when it’s family of choice. If Garp hadn’t been willing to go the full mile, he should have handed the kid to the Blackjack’s instead. They, at least, could be trusted with children!

(Why, Captain, why Monkey fucking D. Garp of all people?)

(Yet another thing Buggy will never understand about his Captain, yet another thing he’s not sure he’ll ever be able to forgive the man.)

(How the hell had Blackjack D. Rouge allowed that to happen? She  _ loathed _ Garp with a passion, for Davy Jones’ sake!)

(She definitely kicked Captain’s ass when she joined him on the Flying Dutchman, Buggy thinks. Because there’s no way the Queen of Spade agreed to this.)

(He hopes she made it  _ hurt _ .)

Anyway.

So, Monkey D.Garp is facing off against the Phoenix, who looks ready to flambe him, and Buggy wishes the Shirohige good luck with that. Whitebeard is trying to rally his troops, who faltered somewhat when Garp decided to get off his ass and actually join the fight, but then the lava asshole, Akainu, challenges him and the Yonko has to divert his attention fully to the fight if he wants to make it.

Akainu would never have managed to so much as scratch Edward Newgate if the man had still been in his prime, Buggy knows. Even now, even with a sword in his chest and losing blood slower than expected -  the Nightingale’s work, surely - Newgate remains a fucking monster. Still, he’s very much  _ not _ in his prime anymore, and the Red Dog of the Military is yapping at his heels something fierce. Buggy keeps a metaphorical eye on that particular fight with his haki, if only to avoid getting caught in one of Newgate’s stupid earthquakes, and moves on, focusing on the other admirals.

Kizaru won’t be a problem much longer, Buggy notices. Not when he’s already sporting his own hole in the chest, and has just lost his right arm to Rayleigh’s sword. A quick check with his Haki confirms it - the admiral is a dead man walking. If the blood loss doesn’t get him first, Rayleigh will, or the poison Buggy can barely feel will do him in instead. Slightly overkill, really, but no less than what he deserves, really. Condescending asshole. Buggy hasn’t really faced him before, he’s smart enough not to provoke an admiral if he can avoid it, but some of his cellmates had talked about him, and what he had seen today just confirmed their description. Beside, one less monster admiral can only be a good thing, really.

If he’s lucky, either Whitebeard or Rush will get rid of Akainu and then there will only be Aokiji to deal with, and the ice-man is soooo much easier to put up with. Mostly because he’s a lazy ass who prefers to take people alive than dead, and happens to be one of the only marines with something resembling a conscience.

Buggy can only hope.

* * *

He winces when he caught sense of Portgas’ Voice. The boy is a  _ Mess _ with capital M, radiating guilt and self-loathing and disbelief and Buggy wants to punch someone. He doesn’t even know the kid, has only met him that one time way back then when the brat had only just started and Buggy had decided to test his resolve, but no one should be made to feel like that. And it’s not because he’s captain’s son (or, at least, not  _ just  _ because of that), Buggy is aware that the kid doesn’t consider Roger his father for very valid reasons, and it’s not because he’s Rouge’s son either (even if the very idea of someone being of that menace’s bloodline having so much trouble believing that they are worth something seems impossible), and it’s not even because he’s one of Whitebeard’s.

It’s because, twenty one or not, Portgas D. Ace is just a fucking  _ kid _ . And that kind of internalised self-hatred? That takes  _ years  _ to build up to those levels. Which means that this has been happening for a long time. And Buggy is an asshole, and a coward, and a thief and many a thing beside, but he will never, ever put a child through what’s he’s been through if he can help it. Children should be protected, prepared for the world out there but never thrown to the wolves like that.

* * *

(Buggy mentally adds another line to his list of motives for Monkey D. Garp’s murder, and crosses his fingers that he might get a chance to off the man himself during the chaos at some point.)

There’s a sudden pinpoint burst of armament Haki from where Crocus has strong-armed the other doctors into staying away from his patient, but Buggy doesn’t look. It’s Rockstar’s job, now, and the least he has to deal with that headache the better.

And then of course he’s distracted because Whitebeard’s haki flares up suddenly, the distress inside it well hidden but still perceptible to Buggy’s finely honed senses. The man has just taken another step up the Flying Dutchman’s ladder, and there’s blood on his lips as he shakes, body caught in a sudden attack of his mysterious illness, and it’s only a handful of seconds but it’s enough for Akainu to rush toward him, magma fist at the ready, and Buggy braces himself for the Death of the Lord of the Oceans, barely notices the Phoenix getting hit by Aokiji who managed to drag him away from Garp and the way the Nightingale is rushing to Whitebeard’s side, knowing that she will be too late.

And then there’s a Haki-covered object rushing through the air at high speeds and it hits the Admiral straight in the head.

Buggy gapes, one eye watching as Akainu falls back, knocked out in one hit, the other eye flying out of his socket to look towards the Oro Jackson, where Rush is still standing at the helm, left arm still Haki-darkened to show that she had been the one to throw the… wrench. Of course she threw a fucking wrench at a magma devil fruit user. It had to a seastone one, though, because even reinforced with Haki it shouldn’t have been able to one-hit-KO like that, Buggy thinks, but it’s fuzzy, a background noise compared to the reminder that, five foot nothing or not, Rush had definitely managed to become the biggest monster in the crew.

( _ Captain would be so proud) _

“THAT WAS FOR THE MOBY DICK YOU ASSHOLE!”

…

Of course. Of fucking course. What else could prompt that kind of proactive protective action from the gear head but the damage to one of her precious ships?

( ~~_ Davy Jones knows that teenagers under her care didn’t qualify) _ ~~

In the crow’s nest, Riza’s shots keep Aokiji away from the Phoenix long enough for Marco to regain his bearings and avoid the seastone restraints that had been heading his way.

“Oyaji!” “Old man!”

Buggy feels a wave of simultaneous frustration and humour emanating from Newgate. Apparently, as much as the old man doesn’t appreciate a Roger Kaizoku butting in on his fight, he’s still able to see the humour in it. Especially when it’s in defence of the Moby Dick.

(And Buggy might not be as much of a ship nerd as Rush, but even he is furious that such a ship met her end like that. The Moby had been older than the Oro Jackson. She deserved better.)

To be fair, seeing Akainu get knocked down like that by a  _ wrench _ of all things was  _ hilarious _ . Buggy is so glad he’s filming this. He’ll definitely have to get his hands on a recording afterwards, because that image is definitely going on the Big Top’s Wall of Laughter.

The Nightingale, the doctor that hasn’t left Whitebeard’s side except so as to not find herself in his way while he was fighting, is quick to give him a short assessment before she lets the man stand up again. The glare she throws the unconscious admiral’s way indicates that she would like nothing more than to end him there and now, but the fight around them starts up again and some reckless marine form a wall around the mad dog, and so she stays with her captain instead.

“KEEP YOUR DISTANCE!” Whitebeard bellows when it looks like his men want to rush to him, despite the marines honing in on his perceived weakness. “They think that something so insignificant ! I do not need assistance! I can hold out a bit longer! I am Whitebeard! My death... it's significance is not lost on me. And I am well aware of just what that would entail! That is why... that is the very reason why I cannot die just yet! Not until I can secure the future of my sons with these very hands! Isn't that right, Ace?”

* * *

Davy Jones save him from moronic captains! Buggy grinds his teeths.

He’s jealous. He knows it, and he hates it, but he’s jealous because Whitebeard is doing what Buggy had wished Roger would have done. He knows he’s going to die and he says his goodbyes. He reassures his men that they are loved and that he wants the best for them. He tries to ‘secure their future’.

Captain Roger had promised that they would meet again, and Buggy had lived for that day, had endured for nearly two years on a crew that felt less and less like home every day. But then they had come back from Water Seven to Sabaody to find that Captain had stopped by to talk to Rayleigh, and that he hadn’t waited for them to come back.

The sting of that particular betrayal would never fade away.

Then had come the news of the upcoming execution of the Pirate King and Buggy’s world had fallen to pieces.

* * *

(Standing in the crowd, clinging to Shanks with all he had because it was the only way to know he wasn’t going to fall apart, disguised as best as they could, staring up at the wooden stage where their  _ father  _ captain was kneeling, that last wave of haki that rushed over them, full of Captain’s love and pride that couldn’t dispel their despair, their fears. The fall of the executioners’ blades, being unable to look away even as Captain’s head hit the ground smiling. The tears streaming down his face, being dragged away by Marian while the crowd celebrated.)

(Getting back to the ship, sailing away to that little island near Loguetown where a much younger Roger had once met a much younger Silver Rayleigh, to give their Captain one last send-off  _  even if they didn’t have his body, even if they couldn’t give him back to the sea like they should have, like he deserved because this was Gol D. Roger and the Sea had been his home and his life.  _

(Leaving that island with heavy hearts and being completely blindsided when Old Man Rayleigh had started drawing up the drop off order, the other crew members rattling off their destinations. Looking at Shanks with growing dread as they realised that the crew was disbanding completely, that their nakama were leaving them behind to fend on their own.)

(Being dropped off on a busy island in the New World with what little belongings they could carry and their share of the Rogers remaining treasure.)

(Trying to drown their pain in alcohol)

(Buying a ship and setting out on their own.)

(Dangers at every corner, realising that their Captain's enemies were hunting them down now that the object of their ire was dead and gone.)

(Baterilla)

(Two years of being hunted, of running scared and trying to survive both the seas they were in and the hunters at their back, and then a freak storm and losing Shanks)

(Loneliness, crippling and fierce and it  _ hurt _ , there had been a part of him missing and the world,old and new, was even more terrifying without Shanks by his side.)

( _ Would you rather drown, or be burned alive?) _

* * *

A pebble hits his leg, dragging Buggy away from the torment of his past. Rockstar is giving him a worried look, but doesn't say anything. Doesn’t try to touch him either, and Buggy is glad. Between the memories and the reality, he’s wound up tight enough that he would have stabbed first and asked questions never.

Yep. Definitely one of Buggy's favourite. He would have to remember to teach the guy how to hide his Voice even more once this message was over with. It wouldn't do for Shanks to lose such a skilled nakama, after all.

While Buggy had been busy wool gathering, the Shirohige division commanders had taken position at their father's back, protecting him from anyone cowardly enough (or smart enough) to try and stab the man in the back.

Fucking Whitebeard's. Always have to make a production out of every single thing.

Stupid honourable fools. The only reason they had survived for so long was because all of them are monsters in their own way. Anyone else with that kind of bleeding heart and strict honour code would have died a long time ago.

And Buggy can't help but admire them for that, if only a little bit.

“Damn,” Rockstar whistles. “If that picture doesn't make it in all the black market history books, I'll have  _ words _ with some people. I had forgotten how  _ terrifying _ the Shirohiges can get.”

Buggy snorts.

“That's because you're still wet behind the ears. Newgate has always been one scary motherfucker when someone harms what's his, but people always forget that his men are just as protective of him. The man has been sailing these seas for longer than I've been alive, getting into fights left and right, pissing powerful people off as easily as breathing. And yet not a single one of his enemies managed to so much as scratch his back. Sure, he’s  _ that _ good and has never once even thought about running away, but most of that is due to his people having his back and making sure no one would try and stab it. They’re just usually more subtle about it, for a given definition of subtle.”

Because the only one who even remotely knows what subtlety means on that crew is Haruta - another one that wears the mask of the fool very well, Buggy knows. Though he has his suspicions about the Spades’ former first mate, Deuce. And the fact that the man is nowhere to be seen while his captain is on the scaffold just confirms them. Buggy doesn’t remember the man’s Voice well enough to find him in this chaos, but he’s pretty sure that Deuce is quietly setting things up in the background.

Things are about to get even more interesting, if Deuce is still the same kind of guy he had been back when Buggy had challenged Fire Fist before he left East Blue as a rookie. Buggy is definitely glad to be filming this, and he’s pretty sure at least one of the former Spades is hiding somewhere with a visual Denden mushi too - that crew had turned blackmail into an art form.

* * *

“You say you cannot perish until you secure the future of your children?” Sengoku roars over the noise. “I shall show you their future right here and now! Whitebeard!”

Buggy is snapped out of his thoughts by Sengoku’s proclamation, and he lets out a swear as he sends haki-covered fists rushing towards the platform to try and knock out the executioners. He can feel Rayleigh running, the Phoenix flying, but they won’t get there in time and if Buggy can be just slightly  _ faster _ ...

“STOP IT ALREADY!” Strawhat  _ screams _ , and a wave of power rushes across the battlefield, knocking out the more weak-willed marines, just as multiple bullets impact the two executioners.

Buggy is quick to call his limbs back, not wanting to get caught in the fallout. Well. One of his limbs. This is the second time the kid nearly bit the dust because Buggy was too slow. There won’t be a third, not if Buggy can help it, and he leaves his left hand hidden just next to the younger man, and he tries not to think too much about what Shanks’ brat just did.

Of fucking course the brat has King’s Haki. As if he needed another reason to be reminded of Gol Fucking D. Roger. And he clearly has nothing even remotely resembling training in it. That’s it, Buggy is making him Shanks’ problem as soon as the Yonko shows up, no one needs an untrained D with King’s haki running around aiming for the Pirate King’s throne. No one.

Fucking D’s!

“Did he just…?” Rockstar asks, gobsmacked.

“Welcome to the bullshit that is Strawhat Luffy,” Buggy grumbles. “And D’s in general. And D’s with King’s haki in particular. Get used to it, odds are you’ll be seeing a lot of him in the next few months, if not years.”

“What… you want Okashira to teach him how to use it?”

“Who else is going to? That Shanks would trust to do so?” Buggy adds, knowing Rockstar is about to mention Silver Rayleigh.

Like anyone with any kind of sense would trust Rayleigh or any of the other Roger Kaizoku with a kid (and, yeah, seventeen or not, Strawhat is still a kid. A very naive one at that.).

(How the hell is the brat still alive, seriously? The trouble he gets into is ridiculous, and Buggy sailed with Gol D. Roger for fuck’s sake!)

“Shiiiit…” Rockstar groans. “Better warn Ben, this is going to be a pain in the ass I just know it… Ah shit!” He swears, and Buggy turns back towards the brat they’re talking about.

Fucking D’s. The kid is rushing ahead, running in front of Whitebeard’s men even though he’s clearly in no state to do so. Crocus’ Voice is  _ furious _ , the man feeling ready to kill (or, at least, forcefully sedate) his patient.

Buggy is secretly pleased that someone else is giving Crocus some ulcers, but still, there’s a time and place for it, and the middle of this bullshit is neither of those.

“Go for Whitebeard first!” Someone shouts from the marine’s side as they finally start moving. “He's a monster, so don't take him lightly! Do whatever you can to take him down!”

At least someone knows who the biggest threat is. Buggy had started to despair about the Marine’s collective intelligence, Sengoku excepted. The Nightingale definitely takes offence to that, and Crocus takes offence to Whitebeard encouraging Strawhat’s bullshit.

Buggy  _ hates _ agreeing with Crocus on anything, but yeah. The brat belongs in a sickbay, not leading a charge. Apparently, Marco the Phoenix agrees (didn’t he use to have some medical training too, back in the days?) because he goes full bird and picks up the brat before dropping him back at Crocus’ side.

Ah.  _ That _ particular needle brings some memories back. Buggy represses a flinch, even as Strawhat finally gives in to the sedative. He had managed to avoid the seastone needle for most of his time on the Oro Jackson, but he had some  _ very _ vivid memories of the few times he hadn’t.

Those had never been fun.

* * *

The battlefield is littered with unconscious marines (along with some of the weaker minded pirates who collapsed when Strawhat let his haki loose, some of whom are being trampled by both sides as they rush at each other, and Buggy does winces at that, because he’s been there before and it sucks) and it’s easier now to see the major fighters.

The Roger Kaizoku are busy, as are the Blackjacks, and Buggy leaves them at it because yeah. Monsters. He doesn’t need to know. As long as the Oro Jackson stays in one piece, he can focus on something else.

Like the fact that Monkey D. Garp is still alive and conscious and being a massive asshole and Buggy really, really wants to kill him because he’s standing between Marco the Phoenix and Portgas D. Ace, between Roger’s son and his freedom, between  _ Garp’s grandson and his death _ .

Someone needs to kill him, and Buggy’s hand is itching. Sadly, Yadomaru gets there before him. He can’t exactly begrudge her, and the staff to the balls is satisfyingly vicious, but still. He hopes he’ll be able to get his own hits in at some point.

(That particular Bo-staff is also disturbingly familiar, and Buggy is trying very hard not to think about the last time he had seen it.)

* * *

“Aw shite!” Rockstar swears next to him.

“What?”

“The old doc sent the woman - Elena? And Jimbei off with the brat!”

“So?”

“So the brat has the key to the other brat’s shackles! Hancock gave it to him back then, when she hugged him”

“What?!”

“Fuck!” Rockstar curses even as he stands up. “They won’t be able to get rid of the shackles without it, they’re fused to the seastone pillar holding the whole thing up!”

Buggy grimaces.

“Guess that means you have to get involved now?”

“Yeah…” Rockstar sighs even as he starts walking away. “Okashira owes me so much sake for this bullshit…”

“I’ll make sure he pays up,” Buggy waves him away. “Have fun riling the bastard up!”

“You know it!”

Buggy tries to follow Rockstar’s Voice, but the man is skilled and it’s easy for him to hide amidst the chaos.

No matter. Buggy’s pretty confident in Shanks’s spymaster’s abilities to follow through. And in the meantime, he has his own tasks to focus on. Like making sure no one he actually cares about dies today.

* * *

 

(Whitebeard is a lost cause, was one even before stepping onto the battlefield. But if there’s a chance for Firefist to get out of here alive, Buggy is going to make sure it happens. Preferably without anyone else being the wiser, but if he has to show himself, he will.)

(And pray for Shanks to show up and save his ass, because Buggy  _ knows _ he’s nowhere near strong enough to survive this otherwise.)

(But for this, for this kid he’s only met once before and didn’t particularly like, for this kid who probably doesn’t even remember him, for this kid who never knew the closest thing to a father Buggy has ever had, for this kid who never asked to be born, for this kid who never had the right to live according to most of the world, for this kid who was never given a chance to prove them wrong?)

(For this kid who has been hunted before he had even been born, who had been damned for a father who never got to hold him?)

(For a kid whose life Buggy could all too well imagine?)

(To give him a chance amongst people who had accepted him for who he is, neither for nor despite his parentage but because he was one of theirs, because he was their brother?)

(Like Shanks had done for him, like he had done for Shanks, like their crews had started doing for them?)

( ~~Like the Rogers hadn’t done for either of them?)~~

(Well.)

(Buggy owes it his fourteen years old self to at least try.)

(But he  _ really, really _ hopes Shanks will show up before that’s needed.)

* * *

 

Which is complicated by Sengoku finally deciding that enough is enough and going full Buddah. Because things were not complicated enough yet, apparently.

Some days are truly not worth getting out of bed for (or out of Impel Down, for that matter).

But Rayleigh finally makes himself useful, distracting Sengoku and drawing him away from the platform, leaving the Phoenix free to try and get Firefist out of his chains. Buggy ends up sending one of his ears and one of his eyes closer to make sure he doesn’t miss anything.

…

Crocus is still just as aggravating as Buggy remembers. And Firefist is more worried about his moron of a brother than about himself, which is apparently normal enough that the Phoenix rolls his eyes but otherwise ignores him, too busy trying to get rid of the seastone chains.

(Yeah. Those are a fucking pain in the ass, Buggy can attest to that.)

Also, Crocus is apparently going senile with his old age because even with only one eye Buggy can see that there’s no way the doctor’s plan is going to work.

“Davy Jones be damned, you guys are  _ loud _ .” Rockstar suddenly complains, appearing out of thin air just behind Crocus, making the old man jump in surprise, and Buggy has to suppress a chuckle.

Damn. That entrance was  _ perfect _ .

(Second favourite Red-Hair pirate for  _ a reason _ .)

Crocus is obviously getting forgetful in his old age too, because he doesn’t seem to recognise Rockstar at all. Which, rude? Rockstar has been one of Shanks’ men for nearly six years now, and Shanks is a Yonko and a former Roger (for all that seems to be worth in said crew’s eyes…), you would have thought Crocus would at least try to keep an eye on the most important crews.

Firefist has no such trouble, however.

“Rockstar?! What the hell are you doing here?”

“Oh sorry, is this a private party? Am I butting in?” Rockstar mocks. “What a way to greet an ally.”

“Your captain's last visit wasn't exactly peaceful”, Phoenix points out, eyeing him warily. “You can't blame us for being surprised, especially since you seem to be here on your own.”

Rockstar laughs, and Buggy kind of wants to join him. From what Rockstar told him of said visit… Well, he can’t blame the Phoenix for being wary.

“Geez, I wonder why. Was that the time when Okashira came to warn you to call Firefist back because Teach is an asshole that was up to something? The time when  _ your captain _ called him a fool and an upstart and told him to get lost? You guys are so lucky Okashira doesn't hold grudges when it comes to personal insults. Sadly for you, he does hold grudges when you get someone he cares about hurt  _ because you're too damn prideful to listen _ . And since Firefist has made it on the list on account of being an interesting person who managed to keep Okashira's protégé alive for seven years, which, given what I've seen today, is a fucking miracle… yeah. You're lucky Okashira still decided to step in when Kaido decided to be a brat and try for your territory.  _ You're welcome _ .” He adds, crouching next to Ace.

“You're one of Shanks’ men?” Crocus says, finally catching on.

Someone give the man a medal, his two non-medically inclined brain-cells have managed to spark a somewhat intelligent thought! Buggy thinks, mind dripping with sarcasm.

“Congrats on having eyes, though I can't say the same for your memory if it took you that long to recognise me,” Rockstar smirks even as he twists the key in the first lock. “You okay there, brat?”

“What the hell, Rockstar?”

“What? Did you really think Okashira would let something happen to Anchor's brother? You're the kid's family, and the kid is family to us, ergo you are family to us as well. Deal with it.”

Shanks’ men know him well indeed, Buggy muses. And Rockstar is also smart enough to understand that the last thing Firefist has ever wanted is to be linked to Roger in any shape or form. The bonds he  _ chose _ , however, are another matter entirely.

(That Rockstar also picked up on the fact that Firefist does not value his own life, but values his little brother’s happiness above anything else, no matter how hard people have tried to convince him that he matters and is smart enough to make it look like he’s only saving Ace for Strawhat’s sake? Not surprising. That Crocus  _ still _ hasn’t picked up on that? Not surprising either, for a whole lot of other reasons that Buggy will not think about right now because if he does his hand might slip and now is not the time to let old hurts fuck things up for the younger generation.)

“Though to be fair,” Rockstar continues, “I wasn't even here for you to start with. I had something to do in Impel Down, and then Strawhat decided to storm it and here I am. I was going to let the Shirohige take care of it, since they'd made it clear that our help wasn't wanted, but since that lot would rather argue all day than, I don't know, check your brother's pocket for the key Hancock gave him earlier…”

Buggy is definitely getting the man some high/quality booze once all this is over. Crocus’ face is  _ priceless _ .

Crocus draws himself up, ready to ripost.

“Shut up, you,” Phoenix tells him without even looking at him. “He's right. This is not the time for bickering. And Rockstar? My thanks. To be conveyed to your captain in case I don't see him today.”

“Oh, he should be here soon,” Rockstar smirks even as he twists the last lock and takes a step back. “Kicked Kaido's ass and now he's on his way here. That will be fun.”

“Any other people going to show up when I never asked them to?” Firefist grouses.

“Your pals from Wano probably won’t be able to make it in time,” Rockstar responds glibly, but the restraints are loose now and as Portgas stands up they fall to the ground.

In a matter of seconds, an inferno stands in Firefist's place as the flames that had been restrained for so long finally break free.

There's movement from within the flames, and suddenly they shoot up in the air to form the Shirohige Jolly Roger.

Show-off. It would have been so much easier if they could have just snuck away with the brat, but noooo. He had to be a fucking D about it, Buggy grouses.

Some days, he’s pretty damn sure that the D stands for “Dramatic”. He’s got years of experience to back it up, too.

“I'm back in business!” Ace grins as the flames fade from his body.

“You're a menace, that's what you are,” Phoenix tells him, and before anyone can react, Whitebeard's first commander transforms, grabs Ace in his claws and makes for their father. Rockstar disappears into the crowd as soon as Crocus’s back is turned. and Buggy has a split-second to enjoy the outraged look on the doctor’s face before everything goes to hell.

 


	10. Hé, garçon, prends la barre, Vire au vent et largue les ris Le vent te raconte l'histoire De ces marins couverts de gloire Il t'appelle, et tu le suis  (Garçon prend la barre)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “How much longer?” He asks Benn.
> 
> “Fifteen minutes,” his first mate replies, moving towards the coating activator. “Diving in two minutes!” He adds in a roar, warning the rest of the crew to get to their positions instead of lingering around the screen that had been brought up on the deck.
> 
> They would have to put it away by the time they made their appearance, but until then Shanks did not want to risk it. This was his only way to know what is going on in Marineford, what is happening to his friend and nakama and protege.
> 
> This is the turn of the era. And until Shanks can stand on that battlefield, he’s going to pay witness to it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *hides under her desk*
> 
> Here's Shanks promised interlude! Sorry not sorry for not saving you guys from the cliffhanger :P
> 
> I hope you'll enjoy this chapter anyway, let me know whayou thought <3
> 
> Thank you all for all your comments, they make my days <3

Hé, garçon, prends la barre,   
Vire au vent et largue les ris   
Le vent te raconte l'histoire   
De ces marins couverts de gloire   
Il t'appelle, et tu le suis

(Garçon prend la barre)

* * *

“How far away are we?” Shanks asks, not letting his eyes stray from the screen.

“An hour at most, boss,” Benn assures him.

Shanks grits his teeth, but nods, suppressing the urge to scream at his first mate, to tell him to make it half that time  _ or else _ . Benn is already pushing the Red Force as much as she can be, already using every gust of wind and every current to their fullest, rushing to bring them to Marineford.

And to War.

Because this is what is, a full-on War declared on the legacy of the Pirate King, on the last Giant of his Era, on the entire concept of Piracy as Roger and Newgate saw it.

Shanks had been furious when he had seen Luffy’s brother in the newspaper, the announcement of his pending execution. He had liked the brat well enough, that one time he had met him, when Portgas had come to thank him for saving Anchor’s life, and he was Anchor’s brother. He’d seemed like a good person, too, with a decent crew and a well-deserved D that was going to carry him far if he stuck around long enough - Shanks had been looking forwards to the kind of havoc the Spades were going to wreak. He had been a bit surprised to hear that he had joined the Whitebeards, but then again the kid had clearly been craving acceptance and family, so maybe it hadn’t been that surprising. He had clearly been thriving there the one time Shanks had stopped by before this entire mess with Teach had started.

So maybe Shanks doesn’t know the kid well, maybe he hadn’t really had a time to get to know him, but he had  _ liked _ him, had seen the  _ potential _ in him, had wanted to see what he would become. Seeing the kid thrown to the wolves for the Marines’ yearly political stunt had left a bitter aftertaste in his mouth, especially with Blackbeard being named a Shichibukai in the aftermath - that man was Trouble.

Portgas’ announced execution had clearly been a declaration of War, and Newgate had responded in kind, gathering his forces and his allies and charging towards Marineford, leaving his territory with only the barest of defences. Kaido was an annoying brat with a superiority complex, and Newgate was sort of his ally, even if the old man still treated him like the child who had followed Roger and not like the Yonko who had earned his title, and didn’t listen to him when he really should have, so Shanks had decided to make sure to curb-stomp the brat’s delusions of grandeur before heading for Marineford himself.

He had even contacted Rayleigh briefly, just a message telling him that he was on his way to Marineford but would be delayed. Not that he had actually wanted to interact with his former mentor that much, but Sabaody was Shakky’s territory and not telling her he would be coming would be both insulting and useless, as the information specialist would have known the second he came within fifty miles of the undersea city and would have had Rayleigh right there waiting for him. He had just been unlicuky enough that the Oro Jackson’s former first mate had been the one to pick up the denden. He hadn’t stayed on the line long, basically just ranted for five minutes that Kaido was a pain and that Teach needed to die before hanging up without letting Rayleigh get a word in, but he had heard familiar voices in the background and had started to wonder if he had somehow missed the memo about a Roger Kaizoku reunion or if they simply hadn’t invited him (and the second option was probably the most likely, and so he hadn’t asked questions and had hung up before Rayleigh could talk - if the older man wanted to tell him something, well. Dendens worked both ways, not that the man apparently knew that since he never bothered to call.)

He’s dearly regretting this decision now, had regretted it the instant he realized what Sengoku was talking about, the instant the name Gol D. Roger was uttered.

Captain’s son. Captain had had a son, and hadn’t told anyone. Captain had somehow managed to seduce  _ Blackjack fucking D. Rouge _ and convince her to have his child and  _ hadn’t told any of them and _

Baterilla. Fucking Baterilla. There had actually been a valid reason for the marines to be looking for Captain’s hypothetical child on that particular island  _ because apparently Captain hadn’t known subtlety or discretion _ and Captain hadn’t told any of them and hundreds of women, hundreds of  _ children _ had died because of it, Blackjack D. Rouge had died because of it, because no one had known that she needed to get out, no one had known where she had disappeared to, not even her own crew, and fuck but that means that Roger had handed himself in knowing he had a kid on the way, had abandoned Rouge and his unborn child [ just like he had abandoned Shanks and Buggy] and…

Shanks wishes he could punch his captain one last time.

Because this is captain's son and Shanks had  _ met him _ and  _ hadn't known!  _ Hadn’t recognised either side of the boy’s heritage, too busy celebrating the news that Luffy had found a brother, and okay, odds are that the kid on the scaffold denying any and all connections to Roger would much rather be known as Luffy’s brother than Roger’s son, Shanks can’t help but curse himself for not seeing the signs earlier.

But someone else must have.

Because then the Oro Jackson surfaces and Shanks goes deadly quiet, grips the railing in front of him with enough strength to dent the wood because  _ what _ .

They had known. All of them, they had known about Captain’s son before today, probably ever since Portgas D. Ace had crossed the Twin Capes and stumbled upon Crocus (not before that, because for all that Shanks would never ever trust any of them with a child ever again, he knows they would have stopped at nothing to find Captain’s son if they had known about him back then), who  _ had _ managed to recognise him, and he had told the others, and  _ none of them had told him _ .

All of them had known, all of them had gathered together to save this one boy  _ when they couldn’t be arsed to save two kids that had grown up on the same ship as them _ and none of them had told him. Or Buggy.

Buggy who is in Impel Down, thrown there by Monkey D. Garp because he had tested Luffy’s mettle like he had done with nearly all the Rookies that came through East Blue, like Shanks himself had asked him to do because while he loves Luffy, he is also very much aware that the kid only has a very naive idea of what a pirate’s life was like. Buggy who had ended up in Impel Down, ended up taken from the East Blue he had sworn to never leave again, ended up separated from his crew, ended up dragged through the Grand Line by the very person who had brought their captain to the scaffold.

(Monkey D. Garp is going to  _ die _ . It's too bad that Luffy seems to hold some affection for his grandfather, but if a single hair on Buggy’s head has been harmed by the Hero of the Marine,  _ heads are going to roll _ .)

The Roger Kaizoku had known about Portgas D. Ace. They had known and hadn’t told him, hadn’t reached out to him even as they gathered to storm Marineford, showing themselves for the first time in over twenty years. Fighting for a boy most of them had probably never met, if the boy’s own reaction was anything to go by, while one of their own has been stuck in Impel Down for  _ months _ without any of them lifting so much as a finger to get him out. Shanks can only hope that Rockstar has managed to find Buggy - his nakama has been incommunicado since he had started to infiltrate the fortress a couple of weeks ago, and Shanks is worried. Very worried.

* * *

His worry is not abated in the  _ slightest _ when a fucking ship  _ falls from above _ and reveals two of the people he most decidedly  _ did not want anywhere near this brewing war _ .

Of fucking course Luffy would get involved, would try to save his brother. Of fucking course the kid would attack Impel Down and break out the prisoners. Including a former Shichibukai and some Revolutionaries, apparently, and Shanks can already hear his doctor curse at the fact that Ivankov had been unleashed on the general population again, is already readying his own collection of curses because  _ Luffy is in the middle of a war and has no clue what he’s doing and he’s being a reckless idiot _ but he pushes all that aside when he sees Jimbei drop another familiar figure out of the water.

A very, very familiar figure, who does  _ not _ look happy to be there at all. One who freezes at the sight of the Oro Jackson and very, very carefully does not look at any of the Roger pirates, who only exchanges a few tense words with Newgate before disappearing, and Shanks has to take a deep breath to rein his haki in lest he knocks some of his own people out.

Buggy.

Buggy who is out of the frying pan of Impel Down and into the fire of Marineford, and he has no one there to watch his back, except maybe Rockstar because the odds are good that his spymaster managed to sneak on that ship even is he has yet to make contact with Buggy.

Buggy who is definitely the one who managed to snatch the last remaining visual denden mushi before it could be frozen like the others, who is definitely the one who keeps recording and transmitting and showing the entire world just what is happening there.

Buggy who has to be freaking out because  _ what the fucking hell _ . What a mess.

Even sailing with Roger had not prepared either of them for this kind of bullshit. It's not quite Edd War (which was a nightmare and a half and if Shanks hadn't been busy pretending to be a 'real pirate’ and trying to prove to the rest of the crew that he wasn't just a kid, he would have been right by Buggy's side pleading with the grown-ups to take a step back and actually _ think _ because who the hell takes two ten years old kids to  _ war _ ?) But it has the potential to be even  _ worse _ . Between the similitudes to that and the ones to Roger's own execution (or, rather, his suicide by marines), and the talk of  _ Baterilla _ , Shanks is hovering on the edges of a flashback. And he's still an hour away, watching through the denden's feed.

Just how bad is it for Buggy?

* * *

It's not that Shanks doubts Buggy's ability to survive this clusterfuck or to come out on top of most battles he might find himself in, because he  _ doesn’t _ . Shanks knows, better than anyone else, just how strong Buggy is.

For fucks sake, Buggy survived a childhood on the Oro Jackson and teenage years on the run, some of it on his own even. In the fucking New World. With Roger's enemies from both side gunning for him and nature himself trying to get rid of him. Shanks was there for most of it, yes, but Buggy definitely saved his life at least as often as the reverse, if not more. His friend certainly hadn't coasted on anyone's coattails to survive for this long!

But Shanks also knows, better than anyone, just what kind of toll those years have had on his friend. Knows about the nightmares and the panic attacks and the times you can't sleep for weeks at the time because of what awaits you in the dark.

(There's a reason he hasn't been sober in over two decades)

And he knows how hard Buggy has worked to try and put all that behind him, how hard he tries to avoid being put in situations that remind him of that time, how badly it sets him back when he has to face them head on.

They each have their way of dealing with the remnants of the memories. 

Shanks fights them, literally and figuratively, with the help of enough alcohol to kill a man, making his way to the top so that no one can hurt him anymore, so that he can protect those he loves.

Buggy hides from them, avoids triggers and traps with deceptive ease, worked hard to be able to survive, no matter what, to get out and live another day, and to get those he cares about out if he can.

Their ways of dealing are different, but they both work. And sometimes Shanks will see something coming and step away, remove himself and his crew from the situation instead of making it worse, and sometimes Buggy will step in, fight against someone who he should be running from because there’s something he has to protect.

(Because that’s how they are, Buggy and Shanks and Shanks and Buggy and Buggy-and-Shanks and Shanks-and-Buggy, different but complementary, two pieces of the same puzzle that fit seamlessly together)

Shanks takes a deep breath. Then another. Next to him, Benn is watching him warily, and Shanks doesn’t even have the energy to spare him a reassuring smile.

“We’ll get there in time, boss,” His first mate promises him.

Shanks can’t help but worry that they won’t.

* * *

Shanks tries to keep track of everything that is happening, but it’s hard. The battlefield is large, and the single denden can’t cover all of it. Instead, someone ( _ Buggy _ ) set it up to record a global view of Marineford, with the scaffold on the right and the pirates ships to the left, allowing him to keep an eye on the most important figures. Sound is another matter entirely, too much noise preventing him from getting anything other than the few times one of the bigger names decides to roar a statement for the entire world to hear, and even Yasopp’s lip-reading wouldn’t help when the people he’s trying to read are too small for him to see their faces properly. Besides, the sharp-shooter is quietly fretting about his own son, since Luffy showed up on his own, without any of his nakamas, without  _ Usopp _ , so Shanks doesn’t even ask him to.

Shanks can still follow the gist of it, but the details are lost to him.

* * *

(The Blackjack’s presence is  _ not _ one of those details, and Shanks winces at the sheer fury that seems to radiate from Yadomaru. Yikes.)

(Neither is the fact that one of Newgate’s own sons turns against him,  _ again _ because the old man had considered Teach one of his too, once upon a time, and fuck but it makes Shanks want to gut whoever managed to manipulate the guy into raising his sword against his father, because that’s  _ low _ .)

(Also that’s Vortex Spider Squardo and fuck, Shanks remembers him and can guess what was used to convince him.)

(Fucking Edd War)

* * *

He focuses on the image instead, tries to keep an eye on Luffy who seems determined to give him white hair before the day is over, tries to spot Rockstar and Buggy somewhere, to no avail.

He tries not to worry too much about it. His nakama is a skilled spy, hiding himself in such chaos is child’s play for him, and Buggy’s the one who helped him hone those skills the last time the Red Force was in East Blue. They are fine. They have to be fine.

Luffy is very much  _ not _ fine at all, however, and the railing Shanks is grasping is going to need replacing once this is over.

Shanks tries to take comfort in the fact that Luffy is being treated by an actual doctor who doesn’t seem willing to let his patient go. Tries.

Because that doctor is Crocus, and while Shanks can agree that the man is one of the best doctors out there, the fact that the Roger Kaizoku are apparently starting to take a personal interest in his protege is not something he wants to think about.

Rush’s one-hit KO of Akainu is a very nice distraction, and Shanks is very glad that Benn had started recording the whole thing as soon as the broadcast had started. He’s definitely going to rewatch that a couple of time. And make sure that this particular segment would reach the biggest audience possible. That had been  _ golden _ .

* * *

Shanks spots Buggy the second time Sengoku tries to have Ace executed. Or, at least, he spots his friend’s fist, glowing darkly with armament haki, as they rush to the platform to try and save the younger man.

But he doesn’t even have the time to be relieved that his friend is still alive, or worried that he’s being forced to show himself for all that he’s being  _ very  _ discreet about it, because that’s when Luffy decides to reveal to the entire world that he has a King’s disposition. By knocking out about half of the fighters, on both sides. Including, thankfully, the two marines who had been in the process of bringing their swords down on Portgas D. Ace  _ while Monkey D.Garp just watched _ .

If no one else manages to kill the man before the end of this clusterfuck, Shanks is going to have to arrange for an accident to happen. If Yadomaru doesn’t call dibs, because if she does Shanks is going to let her have it. She has the greater claim, and also she is terrifying and he would rather not piss her off if he can avoid it, especially if the Blackjacks decide to stick around and remind the world of their existence after this.

But fuck. Luffy has King’s haki. Shanks had suspected it, all the way back then when the kid had first stumbled into Makino’s bar, but it’s another thing altogether to see him actually use it.

It’s uncontrolled, raw, and it’s obvious the kid has no clue what’s he doing or even that he’s the one doing it, that he’s imposing his will on others, and fuck, but he can’t go in the New World like this and hope to survive, not like this, not when he’s already beaten black and blue and bleeding from too many wounds, not least the hole the laser that Kizaru had used had torn through him.

* * *

“Have we heard anything about the whereabouts of his crew?” Shanks asks, and Lucky Roo, who’s manning the radio station, looks up at him. 

“Scuttlebut has it that they faced off against Kuma back in Sabaody and that he used his fruit to send them away. Given what happened earlier with the Snake Empress, I would hazard a guess that Anchor was sent to Amazon Lily and somehow managed to worm his way into her good graces, most likely by complete accident knowing the brat. I haven’t heard about the others yet, sorry Yasopp, but Rockstar’s contact within the Revolutionaries is being suspiciously quiet so odds are they know and won’t tell us yet.”

Well. Shanks needs to have a talk with Dragon anyway.

“I hear Baltigo is dreadful this time of the year,” He muses. 

"We'll have to stop by and check," Benn agrees, immediately catching on.

Luffy needs a teacher, after all, and Shanks can’t afford to take him on the Red Force, not just yet. It’s not about their promise, because for all that it is important to him Shanks would break it in a heartbeat if it meant saving Luffy’s life, but because life on the Red Force is too dangerous for him to take Luffy on, to allow himself to be distracted. He wouldn’t be able to simultaneously train the boy and maintain his title as Yonko, and there are too many people who depend on him having that title for him to carelessly throw it away.

But Dragon has a base of operations, has some of the world’s greatest minds and greatest fighters working under him, has training facilities and teachers galore. Shanks doesn’t exactly like leaving Luffy with his biological father, but he trusts the man with Luffy’s safety more than he trusts the Roger Kaizoku. Even if Garp had been a real fucking dumb choice as a caretaker, leaving Luffy behind in the first place had protected Luffy more than Dragon, building up his Revolution from the ground up, could have at the time.

Dragon would make sure Luffy was trained up enough to face anything the New World might possibly throw at him. Shanks is not going to give him a choice.

(Shanks is also not going to let Dragon alone with Luffy either. Ryu had mentioned wanting to take a break to allow his most recent injuries to heal up a bit, so Shanks is going to drop him off on Baltigo and put him in charge of making sure Dragon doesn’t fuck up  _ again _ . The Revolutionaries will just have to learn how to cope.)

* * *

 

After his use of King’s Haki, Luffy tries to rejoin the battle again, because of course he does. He even manages to escape Crocus’s needle, at least until Marco the Phoenix shows some of the brains Shanks knows he has under that stupid haircut and hands him right back to the doctor, who promptly sends him off to the Oro Jackson via Elena and Jimbei.

Shanks grits his teeth. It’s not that he doesn’t want Luffy away from the battle, because he  _ does _ , or on the Oro Jackson, the ship is  _ amazing _ and  _ home _ still, for all that he rarely allows himself to think about her ( _ hasn’t been sober in twenty years and there are good reasons for that) _ , it’s just… He doesn’t like the idea of the Roger Kaizoku taking Luffy under their wings.

Not when they failed spectacularly when they were needed the most.

( ~~Not when they didn’t even~~ ~~_ try _ when they were needed the most) ~~

* * *

He spots Rockstar for a quarter of a second, hurrying after the trio, and something in his chest settles, knowing that his nakama is alive and well.

Whitebeard is drawing attention to himself, trying to win some time for his first commander to free his second, with Rayleigh keeping Sengoku occupied and Yadomaru taking out her very valid fury against one of the main culprit, thus finally taking Monkey D. Garp out of the way. Crocus makes his way over there too, Shanks notes, and seems to be arguing with the Phoenix about something. Until Rockstar suddenly appears, making them both jump visibly on the screen. Shanks can’t hear what his spymaster is saying, but given the expression on the Phoenix’s face, he can hasard a pretty good guess.

Rockstar had  _ not _ been impressed by Whitebeard’s behaviour during their last meeting. Not at all.

Neither had Shanks, to be honest, but he’s used to it by now, tries not to let it affect him because those who matter know his worth. But his men always take that kind of treatment personally, and SHanks had been making damn sure not to come too close to Whitebeard’s routes these past few months in order to avoid this kind of situation. Oh well. Hopefully he would get to tell Newgate “I told you so” in person before the aged Yonko boarded the Flying Dutchman. Which is looking to be sooner rather than later, from what he’s seeing.

* * *

“How much longer?” He asks Benn.

“Fifteen minutes,” his first mate replies, moving towards the coating activator. “Diving in two minutes!” He adds in a roar, warning the rest of the crew to get to their positions instead of lingering around the screen that had been brought up on the deck.

They would have to put it away by the time they made their appearance, but until then Shanks did not want to risk it. This was his only way to know what is going on in Marineford, what is happening to his friend and nakama and protege.

This is the turn of the era. And until Shanks can stand on that battlefield, he’s going to pay witness to it.


	11. Loudly the bell in the old tower rings,  Bidding us list to the warning it brings   sailor, take care -  sailor, take care  Danger is near thee, beware, beware,  beware, beware

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Buggy.
> 
> Buggy, little Buggy who is a crybaby, little Buggy who is scared of fighting, little Buggy who would rather run away than face someone even slightly more competent than a civilian, is standing in front of the two kids, his back to Crocus as he faces Akainu.
> 
> Buggy, tantrum-throwing Buggy, who has just stopped Akainu in his charge, who has actually managed to hurt him by physically hitting him, without relying on a distance projectile like Rush had done, is standing in front of the two kids, his back to Crocus as he faces Akainu, and the world has officially stopped making sense.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *waves a white flag from under the table*  
> THE EVIL CLIFFHANGER OF DOOM IS FINALLY OVER!
> 
> Here comes Crocus' long awaited chapter, which nearly gave me a heart attack because I thought the 4.000 words i had written in the train hadn't been saved. Davy Jones be thanked, I managed to get them back, and here we are!
> 
> Here we get some more insight into Crocus' life post-Loguetown, and what happened to him over the years, how he dealt (or rather, didn't deal), with Roger's passing. It does not excuse his behaviour or lack of actions regarding the cabin brats - but it explains some of it, hopefully.
> 
> Also we finally get to see Buggy in action and Crocus is completely confused and it's hilarious to write. Buggy's chapter is nearly ready, hopefully I will have it ready by the end of next week if things go well - and it's a very different chapter, because Buggy might not be as confused as Crocus is, but he is absolutely freaking out and doing his best to hide it xD
> 
> Thank you all so much for all your comments. You're amazing and I love you even if you're all plotbunnies enablers :P
> 
> Anyways, I hope you'll enjoy this, let me know what you thought!
> 
> Warning> potential trigger warning for a more in depth description of Baterilla - nothing graphic, but dead children are mentionned.

Loudly the bell in the old tower rings,   
Bidding us list to the warning it brings     
sailor, take care -  sailor, take care   
  
Danger is near thee, beware, beware,  beware, beware   
Many brave hearts are asleep in the deep,     
so beware, beware   
Many brave hearts are asleep in the deep,   
so beware, beware

 

_(asleep in the deep http://www.sailorsongs.com/asleep_in_the_deep.html)_

 

* * *

Everything is going well. Elena had taken his most recent stupid D. of a patient up to the Oro Jackson to lock him up in the sickbay (and had apparently missed said patient being pickpocketed by another of Shanks’ brats), Kizaru is dead, Akainu is still unconscious, Sengoku is busy facing off against Rayleigh, Yadomaru is taking care of Garp and Aokiji is kept busy as well. Whitebeard is still alive and holding strong despite his state, and Shanks’ rude brat had managed to free Ace, whom the Phoenix had promptly taken up in the air to try and get him away from the battlefield and back with his crew.

Everything is going well, until it very much _isn’t_.

Even though he’s a first hand witness, Crocus will end up needing to watch the footage of the battle to be able to pinpoint the order in which everything went wrong, but it turns out that there are quite a few things wrong with Crocus’ take on the situation.

* * *

Kizaru isn’t dead, not quite yet. He’s _dying_ , and there’s a difference. It’s not yet time to go through his pockets and look for spare change.

Akainu _was_ unconscious, but a young marine hoping to gain his favour has hurried at his side as soon as he could. He won’t be that way for long.

Elena had indeed taken Monkey D. Luffy to the Oro Jackson… but she hadn’t been able to get him inside the ship as the marines had upped their attacks against their ship and she had been forced to join the defense, leaving Luffy in the care of Jimbei.

* * *

But Crocus doesn’t know that yet, and so his first inkling that something is wrong is when a beam of light suddenly springs up from the ground and pierces through the Phoenix’s right wing, causing him to suddenly careen towards the ground in an uncontrolled twist.

The Zoan and his charge hit the ground violently, creating a small crater even as they hasten to pull themselves up, Ace’s fists lighting up as he took a guard position in front of his injured nakama.

His second inkling that something is wrong is a shout coming from the direction of the Oro Jackson just before his idiot of a patient launches himself in the air and towards his brother. Despite the fact that _he should have been unconscious for at least two days with the amount of sedatives Crocus had pumped into him!_

FUCKING D.’s!

He’s jumping down from the scaffold before the youngest Monkey even lands, but the boys are on the other side of the battlefield from him and he knows he won’t make it fast enough. Not with people fighting left and right, not with the ground littered by dead and unconscious bodies (stupid D’s and their stupid uncontrolled King’s Haki!).

He still tries.

* * *

He’s still too far when he sees Strawhat somehow managing to stick a landing next to Ace (and if he wasn’t made of rubber, Crocus would be wincing for his knees, but Devil Fruits make a mockery of his hard-earned medical knowledge and no, he’s _not_ bitter about it at all).

He’s still too far when he sees Ace turn to yell at his brother (and Crocus feels for him, he really does, he doesn’t even want to imagine what kind of hell _raising_ that kid must have been).

He’s still too far when he sees Strawhat pause, falter, and start to list sideway.

He’s still too far when he sees Ace panic, caught between trying to catch his brother and trying to protect his healing friend, sees the Phoenix sending him towards the younger boy.

He’s still too far when he sees Ace catching Strawhat right before he hits the ground, sees him putting down a knee to do so even as he yells frantically for a medic, his voice heard even above the chaos of the battle.

* * *

Crocus is still too far when there’s a furious _roar_ from behind the boys and the fighters around them are suddenly thrown aside by a charging monster who does not care for his own allies, his magma burning friends and foes allies.

Crocus is still too far when Ace throws himself over his prone brother in a desperate attempt to save him from their impending slaughter.

Crocus is still too far when others around the boys realize what is happening and start to move.

(But they are too far away too, too slow, too weak.)

Crocus is still too far when Whitebeard starts swinging his bisento left and right, trying to open himself a path to his second commander.

Crocus is still too far when Garp starts roaring about cowardice and treachery and _those are my grandsons get the fuck away from them_  (and it’s a bit late to develop a conscience, too little too late is how it’s always been when it comes to Monkey D. Garp, isn’t it?).

Crocus is still too far when Akainu bears down on his captain’s son and on his first mate’s protege, and the only thing he can do is watch and _scream_ as the magma fist descends upon the two boys.

* * *

 

Crocus is still too far when Akainu’s head suddenly goes flying backward as if from a powerful, haki-infused kick to the face.

Crocus is still too far when Akainu suddenly bends in two, magma covered hands going to cover his stomach as if to protect it from more attacks.

Crocus is still too far when Akainu suddenly startles and uncurls, hands moving from his stomach to his privates, face torn in pain as he tries to find his invisible attacker.

Crocus is still too far when he realises what exactly hit the Mad Dog of the Marine.

Crocus is still too far away, but he stills stops and stares because _what._

* * *

There’s a haki-darkened left foot hovering, level with the Admiral’s face, just out of arms’ reach.

There’s a haki-darkened right fist, bloody knife clenched tight, darting in and out of Akainu’s reach.

There’s a haki-darkened right foot settling down on the ground just far enough from Akainu’s position to be able to get a running start for its next kick.

And that’s it.

No arms or legs, no torso, no left fist, no head or neck.

Just two feet, a hand and a knife.

Three disembodied limbs have just brought the man who is arguably the strongest admiral of this generation to a stop when no else would have gotten there in time and it’s so unqualifiably _weird_ that time seems to stop as every fighter stares in disbelief.

There’s movement from the side, a hint of blue and white and red, and suddenly the disembodied feet take a literal step back and reunite with their main body even as the hand with the knife continues to hassle Akainu, keeping him distracted as he tries to bat it away through the pain.

* * *

There’s a man standing in front of the two kids, his back to Crocus as he faces Akainu. He’s wearing the same prison uniform as the escaped prisoners Strawhat brought with him from Impel Down, with some additions -  a belt with two pistols in their holsters, five knives, what looks like a short sword probably picked up from a defeated marine.

There’s a man standing in front of the two kids, his back to Crocus as he faces Akainu. He has blue hair half hidden under a hat and wears white gloves on his hands (even if one is currently turning crimson, dyed by Akainu’s blood).

There’s a man standing in front of the two kids, his back to Crocus as he faces Akainu.

And Crocus knows him.

That does not make this entire situation any more believable.

* * *

 

Buggy.

Buggy, little Buggy who is a crybaby, little Buggy who is scared of fighting, little Buggy who would rather run away than face someone even slightly more competent than a civilian, is standing in front of the two kids, his back to Crocus as he faces Akainu.

Buggy, tantrum-throwing Buggy, who has just stopped Akainu in his charge, who has actually managed to hurt him by physically hitting him, without relying on a distance projectile like Rush had done, is standing in front of the two kids, his back to Crocus as he faces Akainu, and the world has officially stopped making sense.

* * *

 

It’s not that Crocus doesn’t like Buggy. Sure, the kid had been an annoying little brat back when Crocus had joined the Oro Jackson, but he had been what, ten years old at the time? So Crocus had cut him some slack. Beside, his tantrums had been _hilarious_ , and sometimes, when his latest attempt at a cure had failed miserably, winding Buggy up had been a great way to bring Crocus’ spirit up again.

So, it’s not that Crocus doesn’t _like_ Buggy.

He just doesn’t understand why the hell he became a _pirate_ , much less why he stayed one.

Rayleigh and the others had told him all about it, about Captain coming back one day with two seven years old kids in tow and telling the crew to meet their newest nakama. They told him of how Shanks had taken to piracy like a fish to water, how quickly the boy had learned how to fight, how eager he had been to rush in battle alongside the rest of them, how fearless he had been even in the face of the worst kind of bullshit that the New World liked to throw at them.

But they had also told him of how Buggy had always been anxious, of how he would shy away from conflict, how he preferred hunting down treasures to getting into skirmishes with the marines. How he always stuck very close to Captain and Shanks whenever he had no choice but to fight, how often he had had to be rescued by others. How, despite being the only one in the entire crew to eat a devil fruit (on a dare, nonetheless!), he had utterly failed to come up with any combat related techniques for it, instead using it to avoid battles even more than before - and this despite the fact that his new powers basically made him immune to knife wounds!

And by the time Crocus had joined the crew, none of that had changed. If anything, it had grown worse and worse, especially after Edd War (and, okay, that had been harsher than their usual fare, but none of them had gotten seriously hurt and none of them had died either, which was far better than Crocus could say about the other side.)

So, when they had decided to disband after Captain’s death, Crocus had expected Buggy to retire from piracy as soon as he could find himself a nice a little island to settle down on. He had known from the start that Shanks would go on to form his own crew, and had expected the redhead to keep the clown with him for a couple of months since, despite their constant bickering, the two had always stuck close together, and that Buggy would eventually realize that a pirate’s lot wasn’t for him and go back to being the petty thief he had apparently been before Captain picked him up. He had certainly never seemed to actually _like_ being a pirate in all the years Crocus had sailed with him, and had never demonstrated the kind of strength one would need to have to live long as one. Why would he continue to try now that Captain wasn’t there to push him to?

So Crocus had gone back to his lighthouse and his whale, and had kept the occasional eye out for news on his former nakama, even if he knew most of them had planned on retiring, at least for now, in order to grieve properly and give the marines some time to get tired of chasing after shadows.

* * *

 

(Okay, so Crocus had gone back to his lighthouse and spent the better part of the next three years so deep inside a bottle that he can barely remember them.)

(He had _not_ taken his Captain’s, his friend’s, his patient’s death well, okay?)

(Asshole hadn’t even let him _try_ to save him.)

(Who asks that of the doctor they _specifically_ hired to try and cure them? Assholes, that’s who!)

(The thing is, doctors don’t usually let themselves get that attached to their patients. That’s why it’s such a bad idea to have someone do surgery on a loved one - the stress of the situation might make them nervous enough to make mistakes.)

(The thing is, doctors don’t usually _live full-time with their patients_ . The thing is, doctors don’t usually have to deal with D.’s and their _stupid charisma and ability to draw everyone in_.)

(The thing is, doctors don’t usually have to deal with the unstoppable force that is Gol D. Roger.)

(The thing is, Crocus never stood a chance.)

(So no, Crocus hadn’t taken Gol D. Roger’s death well. _At all_. That he had even climbed out of the bottle was a miracle that had taken Rush stalking into his house and beating him black and blue until he dumped all his booze down the drain.)

* * *

Anyway, by the time Crocus had been in any state to keep an ear out on rumours about his former crew-mates, most of them had disappeared from the radar, but Shanks had begun making a name for himself and assembling his own crew - the Akagami Kaizoku, how Crocus had laughed when he learned that the lazy brat had chosen to name his crew for his _hair colour_ (then again Captain had just given them his name and then pretended that they were named for the Jolly Roger and not for Gol D. Roger, so maybe Crocus shouldn’t throw stones when he lived in a glass house, but _still_.). There had been no mention of Buggy sailing with him, though, and so Crocus had shrugged and assumed that the kid had found himself a nice treasure island to settle down on and left it at that.

Until, three years later, six years nearly to the day after Captain’s execution, a bounty had popped up in the East Blue papers. It had been a fairly low one, lower even than the one Shanks had had when he had gotten his first one back on the Oro Jackson, but the name had caught Crocus’ attention.

“Buggy the Clown”, plastered under a picture of a gangly teenage boy with blue hair and a red nose yelling at the photographer.

Crocus had been surprised, at first, but then had shrugged. Maybe Buggy had felt like he had to stay a pirate because Captain had wanted him to be one. He had quite obviously settled down in East Blue, though, which wasn’t known as the weakest of the Blues for nothing, and his bounty was so small it was obvious that the boy must only be paying lip-service to piracy, so Crocus had let him be. The Rogers were staying away from each other in order to draw less attention to themselves, anyway, especially to the lesser known ones like Crocus himself and the Apprentices. No need to bring the marines down on the kid’s head when he was just starting out, after all. And the kid could take care of himself - the Rogers had made sure of that, even if Buggy had apparently hated every lesson. Besides, if Buggy ever needed anything, it wasn’t as if Crocus was hard to find.

So Crocus had pushed the matter out of his mind as he focused on getting himself back together, on keeping Laboon alive when the whale decided to have yet another fight with a mountain. He had kept an ear out for news, but Buggy rarely if ever made it in the newspaper. Instead, Shanks was in it nearly every other day, or so it seemed, and Crocus had been inordinately proud of the boy even if he still couldn’t believe that the kid who used to get into arguments about which pole was colder had somehow managed to become a _Yonko_ of all things.

They grow up so fast.

Anyway, Crocus hadn’t thought much about Buggy over the years that followed. In fact, the first time he actually learned what had become of the rowdy apprentice had been when Shakky had informed them that he had somehow managed to land himself in Impel Down, which Crocus had had trouble believing. How would Buggy have managed to gain enough of a reputation to get thrown in there?

By pissing off Monkey D. Garp, apparently, at least according to Shakky’s network. The former cabin boy had apparently decided to try and kill the Marine’s grandson, Shanks’ protege, and had gotten thrown in prison for his trouble. Crocus hadn’t quite known what to think about that, about Buggy trying to kill a kid, especially one that was dear to Shanks, so had resolved to think about it once the current situation was over and done.

He certainly hadn’t expected the man himself to fall out of the sky and onto Marineford right alongside his former target.

He hadn’t expected Buggy to take one look at the Oro Jackson and ignore the rest of them either.

He _had_ , however, correctly predicted that he would run and hide the second the opportunity presented itself to him. Apparently, even the years gone by hadn’t managed to shake Buggy out of his scaredy-cat behaviour. Really. If the boy had to remain a pirate, he could at least have tried harder to show that he had once been deemed worthy of sailing with the Pirate King!

He had not, never in a million years, expected Buggy to actually step in and fight.

Especially against the worst of the admirals, the one who had _earned_ his “mad dog” moniker.

And yet.

And yet.

* * *

 

And yet there Buggy is, standing in front of the two kids, his back to Crocus as he faces Akainu, and Crocus still can’t quite believe his eyes or his haki as he exchanges a disbelieving glance with Gulliver who had started to run towards the scene before stopping dead in his track just like Crocus had.

He starts moving again, swerving to avoid the people staring dumbly, and by the time Buggy opens his mouth to speak, Crocus is close enough to hear it.

* * *

 

“Attacking people from behind, Akainu? And here I thought you people had an image to maintain. Then again, we both know that the Marines have never stopped to think about how despicable their actions are.”

There’s a growl from between clenched teeth as Akainu continues to attempt dodging the knife-hand who refuses to leave him alone.

“After all,” Buggy continues, and Crocus is surprised by the cold fury in the clown’s voice. “It was the marines, not pirates, who _slaughtered_ hundreds of children, mothers, and unborn children because they were _so afraid_ that the Pirate King might possibly have fathered a child. How is that _Justice?”_

Behind Buggy, Ace is staring at him, his face having lost all colour when he realised what he was talking about.

“Two hundred seventy eight children under the age of three - one hundred fifty six little girls, one hundred twenty two little boys, some of them just hours old. Three hundred forty two pregnant women and at least that many unborn children, as some of them had been pregnant with twins or triplets. That’s how many innocent people died under Marines hands on the Island of Baterilla. That’s without counting the damage done to their remaining families, the children who grew up without their mothers or siblings, the spouses left grieving, the relatives who lost a member of their families.”

Buggy’s voice is ice-cold, his words mechanical, and Crocus has to take a step back as the numbers registers. He had heard of the Baterilla Massacre, of course, even if he hadn’t known the truth behind it until much later (and had promptly jumped back into the bottle for a few weeks after that), but the sheer scale of it had never quite hit him.

And Buggy speaks as if he had been there. As if he had witnessed it.

“They had to dig a new graveyard, just for them. The “Lost Generation”, the people there call them. The Martyrs. So tell me, Akainu, Admiral of the Marines, defender of the Absolute Justice : what was their crime?”

The silence that fell over the battlefield when Buggy started speaking is deafening. Even Sengoku has stopped fighting, for all that Raleigh is keeping a wary eye on him. Garp is face down in the dirt, stopped by Hina and Smoker when he tried to tackle Akainu before he could reach the kids.

Crocus can’t tear his eyes away from Buggy.

Who waits for an answer all of a handful of seconds before scoffing.

“Fire-fist” he states, not looking away from Akainu who has finally uncurled from his previous position and who seems to be preparing himself for another attack if the heat haze around his arms is any indication. “Take Strawhat and get the fuck away from here. Shanks would never forgive either of us if the kid doesn’t make it. He’s hurt enough as it is - I would rather spare myself the additional lecture. And I don’t think your father would enjoy seeing you dead either, and I would rather spare myself the pain of Newgate’s anger.”

Strange sentiment from someone who supposedly tried to kill the boy himself not so long ago, Crocus thinks, baffled, even as Ace stares at the clown, shell-shocked.

“They are enemies of the World!” Akainu roars, drawing himself up to his full height. “I will not allow their tainted blood to live any longer!”

Buggy ignores him.

Faced with the worst of the admirals, the most bloodthirsty, and Buggy  _is ignoring him_!

“Phoenix! Get those idiots out of here before they get each other killed!” He yells at Whitebeard’s First commander who had tried to throw himself over the two boys when he had heard Akainu approaching but had been slowed down by his injury - an injury that is now completely healed, Crocus notes, slightly envious.

For a moment, Crocus thinks the Phoenix is going to protest, say something about being ordered around by one of Roger’s cabin brats, but the man gives a terse nod at Buggy’s back instead before moving faster than most people can follow, transforming in one swift movement and grabbing his frozen nakama in his claws, Ace holding onto his brother. Seconds later, they are in the air again, and Crocus tries to follow their trajectory but he still can’t tear his eyes away from Buggy, who hasn’t moved an inch even as Akainu punches his hand away with a magma infused fist. The boy barely even flinches, even though that must have hurt like a bitch, haki or no haki!

What the hell? Who is that man and what has he done with the Buggy Crocus had known?!

“You worm!” Akainu is roaring, and Crocus belatedly realizes that the admiral has started moving, charging towards the one who had let his prey escape, and he _swears._ “I won’t let them escape!”

Buggy still doesn’t move, his right hand merging back with his arm, and Crocus starts to run. He doesn’t know what the hell is going on with Buggy, but he knows that, without the element of surprise and faced with a furious admiral, the brat is no match for his opponent and Crocus will be damned if he lets one of his nakama die on his watch _again_!

But Buggy isn’t moving, and Akainu _is_ and Crocus prepares to throw his harpoon because he _knows_ he won’t make it in time and none of the other Rogers are close enough to try anything.

He misses. His harpoon flies through the air right where Akainu had been a fraction of a second before, grazing the man but not stopping him at all, and Crocus is cursing with all he has even as he runs faster than he ever has, hoping against all hope that he’s not about to witness the death of the former cabin brat who had finally found enough courage to stay and fight rather than run away even if had chosen a damn inconvenient time to do so!

There’s a single gunshot, and Akainu falls backward, as if in slow motion, magma disappearing from his limbs, a single bullet hole in his forehead, right between his eyes.

Crocus turns around instinctively, looks at RIza to thank her, only to find her looking as surprised as he is, and then he looks back at Buggy to find him with his left arm raised, gun still smoking.

“Seastone bullets. You really shouldn’t leave stuff like that just lying around, Marines aren’t the only ones who know how to use them,” Buggy speaks up, deceptively calm, as if he hasn’t just killed the man who had arguably been the strongest Admiral of his generation.

_What. The. Fucking. Hell?_

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did tell you we would finally see Buggy in action, didn't I?


	12. So manchen von uns sah'n wir sterben, Doch keiner von uns hat geweint, Scharfe Klippen sie brachten Verderben, Der Kahn ging zum Teufel derweil.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And then he freezes because fuck, that is Akainu’s Haki and why the fuck had no one offed him while he was unconscious, why, and now the man is up and charging towards the two kids and the Phoenix is too injured to do anything and everyone else is too far away and Buggy can’t sense where Rockstar is right now but he can sense that no one else will make it in time, can sense the moment Firefist realizes that and decides to throw himself over his faltering brother, can sense Whitebeard’s rage and despair, mingled with the rest of the Whitebeards and the fury of the Blackjacks and the desperation of the Roger Kaizoku and the sheer grief and rage emanating from Monkey D. Garp as he tries to get to his grandsons but is stopped by other marines and fuck but it’s too much, too much and it feels too much like Edd War and Loguetown and Baterilla and Buggy can’t stand it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys, I can't even... the response to the last chapter was AMAZING. You made me CRY. I love you guys so much you have no idea. I had had a pretty crappy week and you made everything better. Thank you SO MUCH.
> 
> Ahem.
> 
> Anyway, for this chapter, usual warnings apply: bring your own tissues, FEELS are ahead, so is bitterness, and Baterilla will be discussed in slightly more details - nothing graphic, but... well. Buggy was there. He and Shanks got there too late to save anyone, but not too late to help bury them.
> 
> This chapter was bit weird to write, very much stream of consciousness, with long run on sentences as Buggy tries to deal with his panic. I hope I managed to bring it across without confusing people too much.
> 
> You guys are awesome. I don't know when the next chapter will be out, I've got nothing written yet, but I'll try and have something out before the end of March - at least an interlude chapter with everyone else's reaction!
> 
> Anyway, I hope you'll enjoy this chapter as much as you did the last one <3 let me know what you thought!

So manchen von uns sah'n wir sterben,  
Doch keiner von uns hat geweint,  
Scharfe Klippen sie brachten Verderben,  
Der Kahn ging zum Teufel derweil.

(And some of us we saw die  
But none of us cried  
Sharp cliffsides brought ruins  
The ship went to Hell meanwhile)

**Auf einem Seemannsgrab**

* * *

 

It goes to hell so fast that the only reason Buggy is not surprised by it is because everything had been going _too well_ for it not to go to hell at the worst moment and he had kept his Observation Haki turned up to the maximum even if the death and suffering assaulting him was _this close_ to overwhelming him.

(It’s yet another reason he has always hated large scales battles like this one, because his Observation Haki has always been too sensitive, too prompt to pick up on people’s feelings rather than just their presence, and he had only found _that_ particular tidbit out when Roger had decided to _slaughter_ an entire _army_ over a perceived insult. That had been fun. Not.)

(Hundred of Voices snuffed out, their sudden absence absolutely _deafening_ and Buggy had been eight years old and had nearly gone mad, had nearly thrown himself overboard in the hopes that the sea would drown out the _noise_ and it had only been Shanks Voice, so loud and unashamed and worried and so uniquely _Shanks_ that Bugge could recognise it even amongst the chaos around them, that had anchored him back into reality.)

He senses Kizaru gathering the last dregs of his strength just as the Phoenix takes to the air with his charge held in his claws, and his left hand is rushing towards the fallen Admiral to try and stop him, but it’s too late: his knife hits the man’s jugular seconds after the light beam pierces the Phoenix’s wing.

Even as his left hand is twisting the knife to make sure that the Devil fruit user _stays fucking dead_ , Buggy is already sending his right hand towards where the Phoenix is falling.

When he senses Monkey D. Fucking Luffy regaining consciousness despite the amount of sedative Crocus _must_ have injected him with, Buggy swears and sends his feet away for good measure, calling his left hand back so as to not leave himself defenseless. He _loathes_ being limbless like he is right now, but his Haki tells him that there is no one close enough to see him right now so he can cope with it for a few seconds instead of turning into a gibbering anxious wreck like he usually would.

(He’s trying to push that away for now, but as soon as Shanks shows up and takes him away from this place Buggy just _knows_ he’s going to have a complete breakdown. He just _refuses_ to have it here, or anywhere where anyone other than Shanks might see it. _Especially_ the Roger Kaizoku, much as he longs for the strong walls of the Oro Jackson right now. Oro, at least, he could count on to watch his back if he needs it, to protect him as he breaks down, to comfort him in their own particular way instead of mocking him for his moment of weakness. The rest of them? Not so much.)

Fuck but Shanks needs to get his ass here _yesterday_ , Buggy thinks as he watches Strawhat propel himself away from the safety of the Oro Jackson and right back in the middle of the fray, landing right next to his brother in a manner that has Buggy wincing from the strain that must have put on his knees. Had no one ever taught the brat how to land properly? Rubber or not, that could not possibly be good for his knees!

And then he freezes because fuck, that is Akainu’s Haki and why the fuck had no one offed him while he was unconscious, _why_ , and now the man is up and charging towards the two kids and the Phoenix is too injured to do anything and everyone else is too far away and Buggy can’t sense where Rockstar is right now but he _can_ sense that no one else will make it in time, can sense the moment Firefist realizes that and decides to throw himself over his faltering brother, can sense Whitebeard’s rage and despair, mingled with the rest of the Whitebeards and the fury of the Blackjacks and the desperation of the Roger Kaizoku and the sheer _grief and rage_ emanating from Monkey D. Garp as he tries to get to his grandsons but is stopped by other marines and fuck but it’s too much, too much and it feels too much like Edd War and Loguetown and _Baterilla_ and Buggy can’t stand it.

* * *

He hadn’t wanted to step in, had kept hoping that he wouldn’t need to, that the Whitebeards would manage to free their second commander while the Blackjacks and Rogers ran interference and that he could allow himself to remain a simple witness, to simply make sure that the Marines would not be able to sweep all of this under the rug.

Not because Buggy doesn’t want the kid to survive, but because Buggy is very much aware of his abilities and knows that he will only be able to act as a literal meat shield, to win the kid some precious seconds but not much more, and that if none of the heavy hitters on the boy’s side were able to come to his help, if they had to rely on _Buggy_ to get them out, then that would mean that they were screwed anyway.

And it’s not that Buggy doesn’t want the kid to survive, because he _does_ , because the kid is a _kid_ and doesn’t deserve any of this bullshit and he’s _captain’s kid_ and he’s Shanks’s kid’s _brother_ and he’s _Blackjack D. Rouge’s son_ and he hasn’t raised nearly enough hell yet to join Davy Jones this soon, but Buggy can’t allow himself to throw his life away either, not like he might have done a decade or two ago when he had just wanted everything to _stop_ . Not when he has his crew to think about, his crew who is _waiting for him_ in East Blue, who has enough _trust_ in him to know that he will _always_ come back for them, his crew who can’t afford to lose him or for him to gain too much attention from the Marines because they are _not ready_ , _not strong enough_ to survive _that_.

(Because he had never wanted them to go through what he had, had never wanted to take them through the Grand Line much less to the New World, because they didn’t deserve that, didn’t deserve to go through the hell that he had gone through)

(Because none of them even _wanted to_ , all of them were _happy_ to remain small-time pirates in the calmest of the Seas, and Buggy didn’t see any reason to change that since _he_ had been perfectly happy to never ever leave East Blue again.)

* * *

But Akainu is rushing towards the two brothers, magma encasing his fists, and Buggy remembers being small and hiding in Captain Roger’s cabin during a particularly bad storm, remembers Captain Roger holding him and comforting him after Edd War, never quite apologizing but helping him through the nightmares and the panic attacks, his haki tainted by what Buggy would later recognise as quiet guilt for putting him through this in the first place, remembers reaching Raftel and the things he had learned and how Captain Roger had let Shanks and him stay in his cabin for two weeks, never breathing a word of it to the rest of the crew as the two tried to deal with what had happened on that island at the end of the world, remembers Captain Roger’s last embrace that day he had disbanded the crew and he remembers his ~~father’s~~ Captain’s last goodbye, that wave of Haki filled with _love_ and _pride_ and he remembers the graves he had helped dig on an island in South Blue and he remembers Shanks and he remembers _burninganddrowning_ and he remembers wishing for an adult to save him, to help him, to tell him things would be alright and that he was just a kid and that he shouldn’t have had to go through all of that, and he remembers the broken look in Firefist’s eyes, the stunned look on his face when he had realised that his crew, his _family_ cared enough about him to go to _war_ for him and…

And Buggy hopes his crew will forgive him, hopes that they are safe on the island Shanks had told them to hide on, hopes that he will still be able to go back to them after this, hopes that Shanks will take care of them if he can’t, hopes he’s not about to bring down the full might of the Marines on their heads, hope he will survive this, hopes that Shanks will be there soon because he has no idea how long he will be able to keep this up, and he takes a deep breath and he _moves_.

* * *

His limbs are far from him but they are still _his_ and it’s as easy as breathing to coat them in armament Haki, to direct his feet and his hand to where he wants them to go and…

His left sole rises up to collide with Akainu’s face with the strength of a fifteen meters running start. His right hand stabs a serrated knife straight into Akainu’s stomach and twists it for good measure. His right foot has its own target and Buggy feels a short moment of intense satisfaction as it impacts with Akainu’s crotch with a force equivalent to that of a cannonball, hopefully crushing any chance the man had of ever reproducing (because Davy Jones knows the world does not need _that_ on top of everything else that is already wrong with this fucking world).

His left foot. His right hand. His right foot. It doesn’t amount to much, individually or together, but _somehow_ it’s enough to stop the marine in his tracks as he bends in two from the sudden, unexpected pain, and Buggy doesn’t allow himself to think about what he’s just done, he uses his feetless legs to take a running start and jump from the roof he had been hiding on, throwing himself over the battlefield and letting his feet call his body back to them instead of doing the reverse and suddenly he’s on his feet again, standing between the Mad Dog of the Marine and his prey, his back to the children (because they are still _children_ Davy Jones damn it, no matter how old they are, they are _children_ who should _never_ have been thrown into this situation, who should never have had to bear the sins of their fathers, who should never have been the victims of decades old grudges held by men who lost their chance at vengeance against the ones who had been their targets in the first place), to the children and to Crocus whose disbelief he can _feel_ (and he doesn’t know if that hurts or not and he can’t afford to think about it right now and adds it to the pile of things he will have a breakdown over later) and he takes a deep breath and tries not to shake.

* * *

( _what the hell am i doing i am going to die shanks is going to have a fit what is going to happen to my crew shanks better take care of them i am too young to die i should have died long ago oh shit he’s pissed what the fuck am i doing why are they not moving they need to run now i am not going to last long  fuck fuck fuck fuck davy jones have pity of me i don’t want to die i can’t do that to shanks not again i don’t want to die i don’t want to burn please please please i don’t want to burn alive i would rather drown-)_

* * *

He’s absolutely, completely terrified, and yet he braces himself and forces himself to stand tall.

He’s absolutely terrified, and yet there Buggy is, standing in front of the two kids, his back to Crocus as he faces Akainu.

He’s absolutely terrified, and yet there Buggy is, standing in front of the two kids, his back to Crocus as he faces Akainu, and he straightens his shoulders and raises his head and doesn’t let anything show because he _can’t afford it_.

* * *

His right hand is still attempting to stab Akainu, the movement easy to keep up despite Buggy’s focus being very much on not pissing himself and asking himself what Shanks would do in this situation.

Buggy is neither a swordsman nor a yonko, and he doesn’t have a King’s Disposition either, so sarcasm is the only thing he can fall back to. Thankfully, that is one thing he _does_ have experience with.

“Attacking people from behind, Akainu? And here I thought you people had an image to maintain. Then again, we both know that the Marines have never stopped to think about how despicable their actions are.”

There’s a growl from between clenched teeth as Akainu continues to attempt dodging the knife-hand who refuses to leave him alone.

“After all,” Buggy continues, and once he’s started it’s easier to keep going, to work himself up to a good rant because he’s wanted to say this for over twenty years, to put the blame for this right where it actually belonged, and the Denden that he managed to hide in his hat is filming this, facing Akainu rather than Buggy himself in a last-ditch attempt not to end up on the Marines’ most wanted list, is _hearing_ this and is _sharing_ this with the entire world. “It was the marines, not pirates, who _slaughtered_ hundreds of children, mothers, and unborn children because they were _so afraid_ that the Pirate King might possibly have fathered a child. How is that _Justice?”_

He can feel the startled intake of breath behind him, the flash of _grief unending_ from the boy who never knew his mother, and he feels a stab of guilt for hurting the kid but the truth needs to be told, needed to be told years ago and maybe if Buggy had been less of a coward back then all of this could have been avoided.

“Two hundred seventy eight children under the age of three - one hundred fifty six little girls, one hundred twenty-two little boys. Three hundred forty two pregnant women and at least that many unborn children, as some of them had been pregnant with twins or triplets. That’s how many innocent people died under Marines hands on the Island of Baterilla.”

He knows the number by heart, because he counted them, because he and Shanks got there too late to save anyone but not too late to bury some of them, and they had dug graves for what seemed like weeks, too small graves for too small coffins for too small lives snuffed out too soon.

Sometimes, he thinks he can still feel earth under his fingernails and he spends hours trying to wash it off.

“That’s without counting the damage done to their remaining families, the children who grew up without their mothers or siblings, the spouses left grieving, the relatives who lost a member of their families.”

Yet more graves they had had to dig, for mothers and fathers and spouses who could not take the loss of their daughters and wives and grandchildren and children and chose to join them in the ground, and Buggy has tried very hard not to remember but now it’s all he can see, the rows and rows of new graves with too small tombstones because there hadn’t been enough slabs for so many names, and he feels himself grow numb as he tells the world. A buster call would have been kinder, he thinks sometimes, because they would all have gone together at least.

“They had to dig a new graveyard, just for them. The “Lost Generation”, the people there call them. The Martyrs. So tell me, Akainu, Admiral of the Marines, defender of the Absolute Justice : what was their crime?”

* * *

The silence that fell over the battlefield when Buggy started speaking is deafening.

Everyone around him is staring, but Buggy tries to ignore it. It’s easier, now, because he’s so _angry_ about the whole Baterilla thing that it’s pushing his fear down, at least for now. He’s going to pay for it later, he knows, but hopefully by then Shanks will have shown up to save the day.

(If he doesn’t, well. Buggy will probably be too dead to care.)

(Buggy is aware that his thoughts are all over the place, that he goes from terrified to numb to angry and back again, from being certain of his upcoming death to knowing that he’ll live for at least a couple more minutes, from hoping someone else will step in to knowing he can’t count on anyone but himself (and Shanks, but Shanks is still too far, still hasn’t made it into Buggy’s sensing range) from being terrified of death to being ready to welcome Davy Jones like an old friend,  but he can’t stop it, can only hope that his adrenaline frazzled brain will somehow get him through this long enough for Shanks to show up.)

Akainu doesn’t answer, of course, unless you count snarling in rage as an answer (which Buggy probably should, given the way Akainu is clearly preparing to run him through with a haki infused magma fist and Buggy should probably be more worried about this but he’s reached the point where he has no fucks left to give and anger is still clouding his mind too much for terror to take over) and so Buggy decides to ignore him for a few seconds in order to get the stupid kids behind him to _fucking leave_ before he’s too dead to be of much use to them.

If he’s going to die anyway, he would much rather it not be for nothing, thank you very much, and oh, that’s surprisingly cynical even for him, isn’t it.

“Firefist” he states, not looking away from Akainu. “Take Strawhat and get the fuck away from here. Shanks would never forgive either of us if the kid doesn’t make it. He’s hurt enough as it is - I would rather spare myself the additional lecture.” Shanks will never forgive Buggy if he gets himself killed either, though, and Buggy really, really hopes his friend makes it here soon, preferably right now. “And I don’t think your father would enjoy seeing you dead either, and I would rather spare myself the pain of Newgate’s anger.”

Because Newgate is going to die today and Buggy has a feeling the man would also prefer it if _his_ death wasn’t in vain and wow, he had never thought he would ever be able to relate with the Strongest Man in the world and yet here he is.

* * *

Distantly, in a part of his brain that isn’t as scrambled as the rest of it yet, Buggy wonders, hysterically, what his ~~_father_ ~~ Captain would say if he could see him now. What he _will_ say when Buggy joins him on the Flying Dutchman, probably much sooner than either of them would have liked him to.

(Buggy is going to punch him _in the face_. Because this clusterfuck is all his fault and if his captain had known the meaning of subtlety and not decided to trust Monkey D. Fucking Garp with his kid, Buggy wouldn’t be in this situation today.)

(He’s pretty sure Blackjack D. Rouge did that already, though, but that’s not going to stop him. Stupid Captain should have known better)

(Should have told them from the start, should never have kept them in the dark to begin with, should have trusted them enough, should never have left them in the first place, should have had the decency to say goodbye first, _~~should have left him to die in that gutter~~ _ )

* * *

“They are enemies of the World!” Akainu roars, drawing himself up to his full height. “I will not allow their tainted blood to live any longer!”

Buggy tries to ignore him, even as his minds tries to bring him back to the hundreds of too small graves dug in the name of _not allowing Roger’s blood to taint the world any longer_ , to the sleepless weeks he and Shanks had spent running away from people determined to _make sure Roger’s legacy would not live on_. He manages it, barely, and focuses on the Whitebeard’s first commander whose wing has finally healed enough for him to start moving again.

“Phoenix! Get those idiots out of here before they get each other killed!”

Because Davy Jones knows neither of the boys is in any condition to do it themselves, Strawhat unconscious in his brother’s arms (but his Voice is still there, Buggy can still feel it loud and clear, Davy jones be thanked Shanks will not need to grieve him just yet) and Firefist himself going into shock (which is understandable given everything that has happened to the boy in the past few weeks but also very much _not the time_ ) so hopefully the older man will be able to get them away from here before Akainu is done tearing him to shreds.

For a short (too long) moment, Buggy wonders if the Phoenix is going to protest being ordered around by “one of Roger’s cabin brats” like his captain had, but the man gives a terse nod at Buggy’s back instead before moving faster than most people can follow, transforming in one swift movement and grabbing both boys in his claws. Strong wings beat loudly behind Buggy, and seconds later he can feel their Voices moving up and away from him.

He doesn’t move from his spot, not even when his right hand is punched away by one of Akainu’s magma encased fists.

~~( _fire fire too hot too hot no no no no would you rather drown or be burned alive)_ ~~

Instead, he allows his left hand to find the handle of one of the two guns he had grabbed from a fallen marine, the one he had nearly left behind because the feel of it had made him queasy, had told him exactly what kind of bullets the chamber held.

(He’s been hit by his fair share of them, can recognise them easy enough, and has never grown used to the feeling of his strength getting sapped away, never wants to grow used to that feeling because for all that he’s trained himself to never be helpless without his devil fruit again - _would you rather drown, or be burned alive? -_ doesn’t mean he ever wants to be in that situation ever again.

“You worm! I won’t let them escape!”

* * *

 

Buggy still doesn’t move away, his right hand merging back with his right arm and his left hand drags the pistol out of its holster, and he represses a surprised startle when he feels Crocus starts to run toward him, worry and desperation radiating from his Voice.

~~_Is he trying to save me what the hell since when does he care he didn’t last time or does he only worry about having another dark mark on his resume, of being the doctor who let two of his nakama die on his watch?_ ~~

But Buggy has long since stopped believing that anyone other than Shanks will ever bother trying to save him, and he’s not about to start again anytime soon.

(Not when they never tried to save him when he needed them, not when they proved that they _could_ rise up together again if they cared about something enough and hadn’t done so for him, not when they had left him to rot in Impel Down)

(Some hurts are too great to heal, and Buggy will never trust anyone other than Shanks to save him ever again, so he learned to save himself instead.)

* * *

 

There’s only one bullet left in the pistol and Crocus throws his harpoon at Akainu and Buggy knows before the weapon leaves the doctor’s hand that it will miss, and it does, and Buggy should be wetting his pants in terror, should be running away or at least scattering his body to make himself a lesser target, but instead the world has shrunk down to the charging form in front of him, the rest disappearing in a chatter of white noise, and Buggy’s mind, for the first time in years, is completely, utterly silent as he raises his arm.

* * *

 

The slightest pressure of his finger on the trigger and the seastone bullet is exploding out of the barrel.

* * *

 

He only has one shot. He’s never been the greatest marksman with a gun (knives are another thing entirely). Akainu is a marine admiral and a logia who has far more battle experience than Buggy has.

* * *

 

The bullet strikes true.

* * *

 

There’s a single gunshot, and Akainu falls backward, as if in slow motion, magma disappearing from his limbs, a single bullet hole in his forehead, right between his eyes.

* * *

 

“Seastone bullets.” Buggy says, his own voice distant, as if speaking through a fog, as if he hasn’t just killed the man who had arguably been the strongest Admiral of his generation, as if he’s not freaking out now that the white noise is wearing off, as if he’s not suddenly very much aware that he’s just killed his second admiral in less than ten minutes because for all that Kizaru had already been half-way to Davy Jones’ Locker, Buggy had been one who had given him the killing blow, as if he doesn’t know very well what this is going to mean for him and his crew if he makes it out of Marineford alive. “You really shouldn’t leave stuff like that just lying around, Marines aren’t the only ones who know how to use them.”

He needs to get out of here.  _Now._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (I know I already said it in the first author's note, but it bears repeating: you guys are the best readers in the WORLD. I never thought this story would be so popular, that so many people would love this version of Buggy, and I was completely blown away. I love you guys)  
> (And I really hope you'll love this chapter as much as the last one)


	13. Sur la mer et sur terre, Au pays comme à l'étranger, Marin, sois fidèle à tes frères, Car tu as promis naguère De servir et de protéger.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shanks breathes out, forces himself to unclench his hand before his nails can do more than mark his palm.
> 
> Baterilla.
> 
> Buggy is talking about Baterilla and neither of them have so much as spoken that name in twenty years, except during sleepless nights when the memories become too much for them and they find themselves grasping for the denden just to hear each other’s voice, to remind themselves that they are alive, definitely more than a little broken but alive.
> 
> Baterilla, one of his worst nightmares, all of fourteen and on their own for less than six months when they first heard the rumors and high-tailed it there, because if there truly was a woman pregnant with Roger’s child then they owed it to her to get her out and if there wasn’t then they owd it to the people being hurt in their captain’s name to at least try and put a stop to it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys.  
> Guys.
> 
> You're all amazing,okay? And I LOVE YOU SO MUCH. I still can't quite comprehend what happened with the last couple of chapters. I've never had a response like this to anything I've written before. Some of your comments made me CRY. You're amazing.
> 
> I know some of you were confused because I replied to comments early on but didn't update right after like I usually do - I didn't quite know how long it would take me to write this and everyone left such amazing comments I didn't want to wait too long to reply. I'm going to try to reply to comments faster now - but I'll try to mention it in the reply if the next chapter is going to be posted soon afterwards.
> 
> IMPORTANT NOTICE: So. I'm currently writing the multiple POV/Reaction snippets of everyone at Marineford or watching from afar. But. That's a LOT of people. And I don't want to put this story basically on hold plot-wise until I've got them all written. So here's what's going to happen: I'm going to make a new story where all the reactions (save Shanks's which is in this chapter) are going to be uploaded. 
> 
> I will try to have that story up and going tomorrow evening, but no promises - life happens, and sometimes it gets in the way! I spend eight hours a day staring at a computer screen at work, and that leaves me with little energy to do some more screen-staring when I get home sadly, so the next chapters are probably going to have more of a gap, at least between "scenes" (so a Buggy chapter might be posted relatively soon after a Crocus chapter, but the next plot advancement chapter after that might take longer). 
> 
> I'll do my best to try and post at least one chapter a month, but I can't make guarantees sadly :(
> 
> Anyway, about this chapter: we finally get to see how Shanks reacts to Buggy being his badass self! Hint: he's really, really proud, but also really, really freaking out.
> 
> Usual warning for mention of Baterilla, canon-typical violence and on-screen death (but it's Akainu so who gives a damn?)
> 
> I hope you'll enjoy it as much as the others! Again, you guys are AMAZING. Seriously. Best readers a girl could hope for <3

_ Sur la mer et sur terre, _

_ Au pays comme à l'étranger, _

_ Marin, sois fidèle à tes frères, _

_ Car tu as promis naguère _

_ De servir et de protéger. _

_ (Garçon, prend la barre) _

 

_ On the sea and on the land _

_ At home and abroad _

_ Seaman, be true to your brothers  _

_ Because you swore long ago _

_ To serve and to protect _

* * *

Shanks swears as he watches Marco the phoenix crash, hit by what seemed like Kizaru’s last ditch attempt at thumbing his nose at them, swears as Ace stumbles to his feet, immediately putting himself in front of his nakama, swears when he sees Marco’s bleeding form.

Then Luffy jumps straight back into the battle because he has the self-preservation instinct of a _jellyfish_ and Shanks curses the air blue before he has to take a deep breath or risk losing control of his haki.

“Eight minutes out, Captain,” Benn tells him, and Shanks tries to tell himself that he’ll make it, he will get there in time, but then Luffy is collapsing and Akainu is standing and _rushing towards the kids and_ _no one is moving what the hell are they doing?!_

And then Akainu's head is snapping back and Shanks’ eyes catch the foot that slammed into it and he forgets how to breathe. There’s a hand with a knife that lodges itself in Akainu’s stomach, and another foot that hits the admiral in the crotch and Akainu is stopped in his track and the world stops and  _ stares _ .

Shanks knows that foot. And that hand. And that other foot.

* * *

Buggy.  _ Buggy _ .

* * *

The wood splinters between his fingers. His Haki flares.

The image shakes, twirls, as if picked up and thrown around, and when it stabilises again it is facing Akainu.

“Attacking people from behind, Akainu?” A familiar,  _ achingly familiar _ , voice, incredibly loud in the deafening silence. “And here I thought you people had an image to maintain. Then again, we both know that the Marines have never stopped to think about how despicable their actions are.”

“Is that…” Benn starts next to him, then stops and starts yelling at the crew to start rowing, to do anything they can to be  _ faster _ .

Shanks barely notices him, or the Sea Kings floating belly-up around the Red Force, unconscious or dead, too busy staring at the screen.

Buggy is standing in front of Akainu, staring him straight in the face if the position of the Denden is anything to go by. Ace and Luffy are behind him, Buggy is standing between the mad dog of the Marines and its prey, between the mad dog of the Marines and  _Ace and Luffy_ ,  Whitebeard's son and Shanks's protégé, the legacy of the dead Pirate King and the future Pirate King and he’s standing there  _ alone _ .

The railing he had been gripping  _ disintegrates _ . It’s all he can do to focus his raging King’s Haki away from his crew.

“After all,” Buggy continues, and he may seem calm but Shanks  _ knows him _ , knows from the tone of his voice, one that he hasn’t heard from Buggy since his friend decided to remain in East Blue, that he is panicking, that is freaking out. So is Shanks, but how much worse is it for Buggy? Fuck but Shanks needs to be there  _ yesterday. _ “It was the marines, not pirates, who  _ slaughtered _ hundreds of children, mothers, and unborn children because they were  _ so afraid _ that the Pirate King might possibly have fathered a child. How is that  _ Justice?” _

* * *

 

Shanks breathes out, forces himself to unclench his hand before his nails can do more than mark his palm.

Baterilla.

Buggy is talking about Baterilla and neither of them have so much as spoken that name in twenty years, except during sleepless nights when the memories become too much for them and they find themselves grasping for the denden just to hear each other’s voice, to remind themselves that they are alive, definitely more than a little broken but  _ alive _ .

Baterilla, one of his worst nightmares, all of fourteen and on their own for less than six months when they first heard the rumors and high-tailed it there, because if there truly was a woman pregnant with Roger’s child then they owed it to her to get her out and if there wasn’t then they owd it to the people being hurt in their captain’s name to at least try and put a stop to it.

(He still doesn’t know what they would have done, had the marines still been there when they arrived, if they had found themselves faced with a literal army hell-bent on erasing any possible heir ot Roger’s Kingdom, them, the two apprentices Roger had taken under his wing and taught the ins and outs of piracy to.)

(He tries not to think about it, tries to drown those thoughts in alcohol like he does with most memories of that time.)

(He’s an alcoholic and the first to admit it, but at least he’s a high-functioning alcoholic and not a nervous wreck.)

(Most of the time.)

(He’s completely sober for the first time in two decades and he would much rather not be.)

Fucking Baterilla.

Too many graves for too many bodies who were far too young and Shanks can still see them, everytime he closes his eyes, the children and the women who died because his Captain could neither keep it in his pants nor keep a secret and he can’t look at his hand, too worried he might find dirt under his fingernails.

His fingers clench once, briefly, wishing for a bottle, but Shanks can’t afford to be drunk right now, no matter how much he wishes he was. Not when Luffy and Ace and Rockstar and  _ Buggy _ are in danger, not when they need him, not when he needs to be at his best to make sure the people he cares about survive this clusterfuck.

* * *

“Two hundred seventy eight children under the age of three - one hundred fifty six little girls, one hundred twenty-two little boys. Three hundred forty two pregnant women and at least that many unborn children, as some of them had been pregnant with twins or triplets. That’s how many innocent people died under Marines hands on the Island of Baterilla.”

* * *

They had counted them, the graves, the too small graves for too small coffins for too small bodies, because someone had to, someone had to know, to remember, even when the marines had done their best to shift the blame, going as far as to dress the soldiers up as bandits and pirates after the first two weeks, making sure that no one on the island would talk by threatening them with a buster call.

So they had counted, him and Buggy, they had walked from grave to grave to apologize for what had happened because of their captain, of their  _ father in all but blood _ , to beg for a forgiveness they knew they didn’t deserve, to pray that wherever they were now, they could find the peace that the Marines had not given them the chance to find in life.

* * *

“That’s without counting the damage done to their remaining families, the children who grew up without their mothers or siblings, the spouses left grieving, the relatives who lost a member of their families.”

More graves they’d had to dig, just when they thought they had buried the last of the Massacre’s victims. Yet more nightmares that had kept them awake for weeks on end, screaming and drowning in sweat.

“They had to dig a new graveyard, just for them. The “Lost Generation”, the people there call them. The Martyrs. So tell me, Akainu, Admiral of the Marines, defender of the Absolute Justice : what was their crime?”

Nothing. They hadn’t done anything wrong, and neither had Ace, neither had any of these children who had died before they even got to really live.

* * *

The silence that fell over the battlefield when Buggy started speaking is deafening.

And Buggy. Still. Isn’t. Moving!

To be fair, that’s probably because the children behind him, in the Denden’s blind spot, aren’t moving either. Luffy had looked quite bad, before the denden moved, and if Ace tried to catch him...

No one is moving, actually, and Shanks wants to  _ scream _ , because  _ what the fuck people! _ Buggy is standing alone between Akainu and his targets and no one, not even Whitebeard, is moving to protect the children!

~~_ Story of his fucking life. _ ~~

Buggy needs help, needs someone to stand by his side because he’s facing the worst of the three admirals, and he’s definitely freaking out even if he’s doing a fantastic job of pretending not to be, and  _ yes _ Buggy is stronger than anyone else knows, stronger than  _ he _ knows, Shanks  _ knows that _ , is usually the one trying to convince Buggy of it, but fuck this is doesn’t mean that Shanks wanted him to have to  _ prove it! _

Akainu is glaring straight at the Denden ( _ straight at Buggy) _ and Shanks can’t do  _ anything. _

* * *

He’s not sure what is worse: not knowing what Buggy was going through, if he was alive or dead, these three years after they got separated, or this, watching, helpless, as his best friend, his brother, his  _ Buggy _  faces off again a monster.

(The three years. Because here and now, at least, he knows Buggy is still alive, still alive and breathing and that is more than he had back then.)

* * *

 

“Firefist” Buggy speaks up again, head still not moving, still not looking away from Akainu. “Take Strawhat and get the fuck away from here. Shanks would never forgive either of us if the kid doesn’t make it. He’s hurt enough as it is - I would rather spare myself the additional lecture.” 

Shanks will never forgive Buggy if he gets  _ himself _ killed either, and he hopes Buggy knows that. Screw the lecture, he’s going to grab his friend and never let him out of his sight  _ ever again _ .

“And I don’t think your father would enjoy seeing you dead either, and I would rather spare myself the pain of Newgate’s anger.”

And, yes, ouch, a furious Whitebeard is not a fun thing to face either, but really, would it be too much to ask for Buggy to worry about saving his own hide? Or for Whitebeard to, you know,  _ actually do something?! _ The man is dying anyway, he can afford to take some risks and turn the Red Dog into dog chow for Davy Jones’ sake!

“They are enemies of the World!” Akainu roars, drawing himself up to his full height. “I will not allow their tainted blood to live any longer!”

* * *

How his teeth have not yet grinded each other to dust, Shanks doesn’t know, but the words are ringing in his ears, echoing memories from the months of running and hiding and fighting when the whole world was gunning for them, to erase all traces of Roger’s legacy, and he doesn’t know how Buggy can stand there and not move, how he can remain calm (at least externally, because Shanks knows Buggy, knows how his mind work, and that makes this even more astonishing, and Shanks would be so fucking  _ proud  _ if he wasn’t so busy  _ panicking _ ) when faced with both the monster that Akainu is and the trauma they had both gone through.

But Buggy does, Buggy’s doesn’t move, he stands his ground and in front of a man that would give even Shanks a pause, that would probably have given even Roger some trouble at the end (when illness had started robbing him of his strength, when tiredness had settled in his bones and in his limbs, when even his unending energy had seemed to wane), and Buggy  _ stays. _

* * *

“Phoenix! Get those idiots out of here before they get each other killed!” Buggy snaps, and Shanks winces, because that means neither of the boys is any state to get away on his own, and fuck but Shanks is going to kill someone these kids don’t make it.

* * *

(He’s not thinking about what he might do if  _ Buggy _ doesn’t make it.)

(He’s  _ not. _ )

(Three years of not knowing if Buggy was alive or dead, and Shanks remembers enough of the first two of those years to know that he spent them either training or at the bottom of a bottle and often both.)

(He remembers enough to know that he  _ doesn’t  _ want to remember those years.)

 

(A world without Buggy in it?)

(Shanks would probably survive it.)

(But he doesn’t  _ want to. _ )

 

(Captain was  _ terrifying _ when he was angry, and he had never been more furious than when one of his had been hurt.)

(Shanks knows himself enough to know that he definitely takes after his captain in some things.)

 

(If Buggy gets hurt, if Buggy  _ dies? _ )

(Marineford will _drown_.)

(But the Marine? The Institution, the people in charge, who have become synonymous with it?)

(The Marine will  **_burn_ ** .)

* * *

Thankfully Marco is smart enough to know when it’s better to retreat ( ~~something Captain never learned, and Shanks is not sure he’ll ever forgive Roger for that~~ ), and though the Zoan is in the blind spot of the Denden, Shanks can see the blue light signalling his transformation, can hear the beating of strong wings and finally manages to breathe a bit when he realises that the kids got away.  _Luffy_ got away,  _Ace_ got away, hopefully carried somewhere safe where a doctor is waiting.

Buggy _still_ doesn’t move, not even when his right hand, the one who had kept trying to stab the admiral, is punched away by one of Akainu’s magma encased fists and fuck but if Buggy doesn’t kill the man Shanks _will_.

“You worm! I won’t let them escape!” Akainu rages, and then he’s moving, running towards Buggy, and Shanks holds his breath even as his nails dig into his palm.

A harpoon surges from behind Buggy, rushing towards Akainu ( _ Crocus? Is Crocus finally, for once in his life, actually going to help Buggy, help the cabin brat who depended on him and who he abandoned? Something happened, Shanks knows, knows that out of all the Roger Kaizoku Crocus and Rayleigh are the ones Buggy can’t forgive, the ones who hurt him the most, and with Rayleigh it’s because he was the first mate, their teacher, their mentor, the one who should have protected them in Captain’s absence, but something happened with Crocus after Shanks and Buggy got separated, and Buggy never told him what, but Shanks knows something did, knows that Buggy has made damn sure to never go anywhere near the twin capes ever again) _ but the weapon misses and Akainu is still moving and Buggy is still  _ not moving _ and fuck but Shanks needs to get there  _ right now! _

(And fuck, Buggy’s crew, his nakama, they will be watching this too, hidden away on one of Shanks’ island in East Blue, and how panicked are they? He needs to call them, needs to tell them that he’s nearly there, that he’s going to get Buggy out, that he’ll make sure their captain gets out of this in one piece, that Buggy gets back to them, but he can't afford to do it right now, not when he cannot take his eyes away from the screen, not when he cannot afford to miss a single second of what is happening. And fuck, but what is going to happen to them after this, the marines are going to want Buggy’s head on a platter and Shanks is going to be damned if he lets them do that, he’s going to sink them all to ocean’s floor before he allows them touch a single hair on Buggy’s head, but fuck, this is going to be  _ messy _ and Buggy is going to hate it, Shanks knows, is going to think that he’s going to put his crew his crew through the same hell that being on the Pirate King’s crew put him through when it's _not_.)

(Well, anyone who tries to go after Buggy and his nakama will have to go through Shanks. Buggy has always been his ally, they’ve just kept it on the down-low until now because neither of them wanted to bring too much attention down on Buggy and his crew, but that’s going to have to change now. He’ll have to discuss it with Buggy, of course, can’t take a decision like that all without consulting him, not when Buggy has had his right to decide taken away from him so often, but Shanks is planning on offering his unconditional protection to his friend’s crew and he hopes Buggy will take him up on it.)

(Even if he doesn’t, Shanks is still going to rain hell on anyone who even thinks about hunting down the Big Top after this.)

(As soon as they get out of there, he’s grabbing Buggy and not letting him go, and he’s locking them in his cabin so they can both have the breakdown they’re staving off.)

(Buggy comes first, and Shanks can keep his own breakdown at bay for a little longer, can give Buggy the space and the safety and the support to let his mask fall and collapse, to break and rebuild himself.)

(Benn and the others can keep an eye on things for however long it takes them to get themselves back together, however long it takes Shanks to get Buggy on an even keel again, however long it takes Buggy to reassure Shanks that he’s alive, that he’s still breathing and that he’s not planning on stopping anytime soon.)

(However long it takes Buggy and his crew to reassure each other, to make sure everyone is alive, to decide what is going to happen now.)

(The rest of the world will just have to fucking _deal with it_.)

* * *

Buggy is still not moving but his arm is and there’s a gun held in his left hand, in his dominant hand, and all Shanks can do is watch and  _ pray _ , beg Davy Jones to watch over his friend, beg Lady Luck to guide the bullet, because Buggy has never had the best aim with a gun, has always felt better with knives in his hands and this is the one shot he can’t afford to miss.

(Because Akainu won’t give him a second chance, and that bullet has better be seastone because Shanks refuses to watch his best friend die on live television, he refuses!)

* * *

The bullet, ever so slightly tinged with the dark shadows of Haki, strikes true.

There’s a single gunshot, and Akainu falls backward, as if in slow motion, magma disappearing from his limbs, a single bullet hole in his forehead, right between his eyes.

* * *

“Seastone bullets.” Buggy says, and ouch Shanks hasn’t heard him sound that dissociated since he found him collapsed against the wreckage of a dinghy on that little stone beach on Depa, and fuck Buggy just killed an admiral, the worst of the admirals and Shanks is so proud he could _burst_ , so relieved it feels like he can finally breathe again, except this is just the beginning of the end because Shanks knew he could do it but now the rest of the world knows it too and Buggy is stuck in the middle of the closest thing this Era has seen to a War with no one save Rockstar he trusts to watch his back and Shanks is still four minutes away and anything can happen in four minutes, _all of this_ just happened in four minutes. “You really shouldn’t leave stuff like that just lying around, Marines aren’t the only ones who know how to use them.”

* * *

 

Shanks is terrified. Shanks is terrified because his best friend has just killed an admiral in front of a literal army of marines and there’s still one admiral left and there’s still Sengoku the Fucking Buddha left and Garp the fucking Hero even if he is still being restrained by two vice-admirals and has been since Akainu first started to charge towards Luffy and Ace, in front of thousands of people and in front of the millions of people currently watching the news, and maybe Buggy’s face hasn’t been shown on the Denden yet but everyone in Marineford knows who he is and there’s no way the marines won’t put a target on his head after this.

But right now, Shanks is also  _ really fucking proud _ .

(He’s still not letting Buggy out of his sight once he gets there. Buggy will just have to deal with it.)

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (I know I'm repeating myself, but)  
> (You're all freaking awesome)


	14. Oh, don't yiz hear the old man say? Goodbye, fare-ye-well! Goodbye, fare-ye-well! Oh. Don’t yiz hear the old man say? Hoor-raw me boys! We’re homeward bound!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> His eyes find Buggy again. With great difficulty: the former apprentice has used the distraction of Teach’s appearance and Newgate’s rage to step away, trying to hide in the thinning crowd, not that he was succeeding very well, what with everyone having witnessed him killing an admiral in cold blood just minutes ago.
> 
> (Yeah, no, Crocus has still not come to terms with that one either.)  
> (They are going to have a conversation after this Davy Jones damn it)  
> (Crocus should not be feeling like their former cabin brat is a complete stranger damn it!)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys. Guys.
> 
> Are you trying to make me cry? Because your comments? Are all awesome and fantastic and i love you <3
> 
> Sorry for the longer than usual dely. Crocus was not being cooperative (hence why this chapter is also shorter than usual and i'm not entirely happy with it) and life was hectic. Add to that that I was also working on editing my original novel so I could start sending it out to agents this month... well, fic writing took kind of a backseat.
> 
> But here we are again, coming together for a Crocus chapter. As I said, I'm not entirely happy with it, and Buggy's chapter will probably be much longer, but this is Crocus realising that he may possibly have fucked up at some point. And not being sure when or how.
> 
> So please let me know what you thought of it!
> 
> Also, how would you feel about me switching to a three-way perspective with Shanks becoming a regular? It would mean three times the same scene, but given how you all reacted to last chapter (I repeat, I am completely blown away by people's reactions to this story i am flailing like crazy), is that something you would be opposed to? Let me know!
> 
> (Also, because I'm curious: how did you all find my fic? On tumblr, browsing, looking for something buggy specific, in someone's rec, etc? Feel free to ignore, I'm just curious ;) )

  
  


_ Oh, don't yiz hear the old man say? _

_ Goodbye, fare-ye-well! Goodbye, fare-ye-well! _

_ Oh. Don’t yiz hear the old man say? _

_ Hoor-raw me boys! We’re homeward bound! _

_ (Homeward bound) _

* * *

 

 

Crocus can’t stop staring. Because  _ what. the. fucking. hell? _

Buggy just killed an admiral and is acting like it’s perfectly normal.

(Captain would be so  _ proud _ )

What happened to the boy he remembers hiding from battle whenever possible? When did Buggy become a man who stands in front of a charging, magma-armed Admiral without flinching, and proceeds to kill him without batting an eye?

Hell, Crocus can’t remember if Buggy ever killed  _ anyone _ during his time on the Oro Jackson, period!

* * *

 

He spares a glance towards his nakama, not quite sure whether he should be comforted or not by the fact that they seem just as shocked as he is. How have they  _ all _ missed this?

One thing is for sure, however. They  _ really _ need to have a  _ talk  _ with Buggy once this is over.

* * *

Crocus is moving towards Buggy again, intent on getting some answers and protecting the younger man from the clusterfuck that is sure to follow now that everyone is slowly coming out of their shocked state, but someone beats him to it.

Well.

Multiple someones.

Newgate has somehow managed to make his way to Buggy and is standing next to him, staring down a furious Sengoku who is still standing by the execution platform and looks ready to go berserk at any moment.

Shanks’ brat, Rockstar (and what kind of stupid name is  _ that _ , honestly?!) has shown up from nowhere to take position at Buggy's back and seems to be bantering with him, too low for Crocus to hear.

There are others, too, some of the Shirohige commanders, Jimbei, Ivankov even! All of them, standing next to Buggy when none of the Rogers have made it to his side yet, and Crocus doesn't know how to feel.

* * *

There seems to be conversation going on between Buggy and Newgate, but there's none of the annoyance and condescension that often taints Newgate's interactions with the Roger Kaizoku.

(Newgate is standing _ next to Buggy _ , next to him and not in front of him, and he's talking to him like an equal when Crocus has just heard Rockstar complain about how the man treated his captain, a  _ Yonkou _ , like a dumb brat and Crocus does not know how he's supposed to react to that either)

* * *

And then there's movement by the waterside and suddenly there's a ship  _ running _ on the plaza, bowling marines over left and right.

What. The. Fuck?!

“Uwaaah!” A random marine screams. “Everyone get out of the way, the enemy's ship has started moving! Don't get near it! It's running on the ground using its paddles! Hey, someone's riding it!”

Crocus does a double take. Yes, that  _ is _ Vortex Spider Squardo and his crew using the paddles to 'walk’ the mini Moby Dick and that should not be possible but apparently it is, and it makes the marines who had started to move again stop and stare.

Fucking Whitebeards.

“Old man! Please let everyone get away! We'll undertake this battlefield!” Said man yells.

“Squardo!” Another Shirohige pirate screams. “It's the Maelstrom spider pirates! Those bastards... Don't be a fool Squardo! Do you have a death wish?”

And ouch, that is hitting too close to home and Crocus pushes the thought away before it can bring the associated memories to the forefront of his mind. Now is not the time.

“Hell yeah I do, after what I did to the old man! Even if it doesn't atone for my sins! This is the only thing that will satisfy me! You have Ace, now get outta here, everyone!”

Oh for fuck's sake! Someone punch that moron and get him to see sense. There is no fucking way Newgate will let that slide.

Almost as if he'd heard him, Newgate's voice rings over the battlefield even as the strongest Man in the world stops the advancing ship with one hand, his eyes never leaving Sengoku.

“Do you know how disobedient it is for a child to die before his father? Don't you get it, Squardo? Don't be so full of yourself! That little stab of yours didn't shake my life one bit! Everyone has their own life span... We've done what we came for. Now, there's no more reason for us to be here! What I am about to tell you now... is my final "captain's order"! Listen carefully, Whitebeard pirates!”

* * *

Oh for fuck's sake. Someone save him from melodramatic captains (or at least give him  _ hi _ s melodramatic captain back).

(Crocus really, really wants his captain back, okay?)

* * *

“Final... wait a minute old man! Don't say such a thing!”

“We don't wanna hear stuff like that!”

“We're all going to return to the New World together, right!?”

It's a cacophony as all the Shirohige try to talk at the same time, try to convince Newgate to change his mind, and fuck but this brings back too many memories, and fuck Roger for not giving them a chance to say goodbye properly and fuck Newgate for doing that to his crew and fuck this shit, Crocus is  _ done _ with today.

Just. Done.

And then there's a voice Crocus is starting to get familiar with, coming from further away yet easily audible even above the noise.

“Old man!”

And fuck but the heartbreak and guilt are palpable in Ace's voice and Crocus is feeling particularly murderous today but he really wants to kill someone right now.

But Newgate doesn't reply to his men, to his  _ children, _ doesn't look away from Sengoku as he stands tall and proud, a beacon of an Age that is coming to an end.

“This is where you and I split up! Every single one of you! Stay alive at all costs! Return to the New World in one piece!”

“O... Old man?! You're planning on dying here?”

Seriously, how far down in denial have the Shirohige and their allies  _ been _ ?! Newgate must have been ill for  _ years _ now, and his symptoms have probably worsened in the past two or three weeks, and yet the man still came out to fight and took a fucking sword through the stomach.

And this is Edward fucking Newgate, for Davy Jones’ sake! Of fucking course he had been planning on dying if it was necessary to get his crew out of here!

“I'm a remnant of my era! There ain't no ship that's going to carry me out to the new one! Go on! All you bastards!”

“Nooo! Old Maaaaaaan!”

(Crocus wants to hurt them. All of them. At least they get a chance to say goodbye, to hear their captain's voice directed at them one last time before his death.)

(Crocus didn't get that. None of them did, and Crocus still hasn't forgiven Roger for that.)

“That's a captain's order! Get outta here!”

“Uncle?!” That's Crocus’ patient, Strawhat, and he and Ace aren't on the plaza anymore, have been dropped on a ship he vaguely recognises as the Piece of Spadille by Marco the Phoenix who is now flying as fast as he can towards his father, and there are eerily similar triplets of undefined gender holding them back from where Ace looks ready to jump right back into the fray.

“Old Man!”

“Whitebeard!” Sengoku roars, probably dreading another Roger-level inspiring speech that would have hordes of rookies taking to the seas.

He's probably right to dread it. Davy Jones knows Crocus is going to need a drink after this.

“This ended up being one hell of a long journey... What do you say we settle things once and for all... marines!”

“Pops!”

“Don't leave us alone, Pops! Let's go back together! Pops!”

The Shirohige are wailing and Crocus understands them, he really does, but he's also trying to repress some memories and they. Are. Not. Helping!

“Did you not hear it is a captain's order?! Go now! Idiots!”

They’re crying and sobbing and screaming, but the Shirohige obey their captain, running back towards their remaining ships while the marines are still reeling from the many shocks that have been thrown their way today.

Crocus can sympathize. He is too.

“Hurry! Follow Pop's words! Pops!”

Crocus chances a glance at the Piece of Spadille. Ace is still trying to rejoin the battlefield, but his nakama hold him back.

“OYAJI!”

Newgate chuckles, and it’s fond, full of affection and acceptance.

“No need to speak. Just answer me one question, Ace... Am I... a good father?”

“Of course!” Ace roars back, and there’s tears in that voice and Crocus would very much like it if people could stop pushing him towards a flashback, thank you very much.

“Gurararara!”

Sengoku is moving now, rushing towards Newgate - no, towards  _ Buggy _ , and fuck but Crocus doesn’t care that Newgate is there and ready to intervene, he’s running before he even realises it, and so are the others, Riza raining a hail of bullets in the marine’s direction, Rayleigh leaping through the crowd, but Newgate is faster and grabs empty air, and the ripples nearly throw Crocus off his feets as buildings around the plaza start to collapse.

This time, though, Crocus doesn’t stop. Not again, not this time.

* * *

“You’re as much of a relic as I am, Sengoku!” The Earth-shaker calls out. “At least have the guts to fight someone from your Era!”

A second later, Sengoku is back in full Buddha mode and Newgate is laughing like the lunatic he is as he raises his bisento. Next to him, back to back with Rockstar, Buggy is pale, but unbowed, and his eyes are fixed on the scaffold.

“We seem to have uninvited guests,” Buggy says just as Crocus comes to a stop a few steps away from him, joined seconds later by Rayleigh.

“Oh? So someone finally noticed us?” Someone guwaffes. “Aren’t you an interesting one?”

Crocus sees Buggy tense, sees Rockstar grip his katana tighter.

(Sees the way Buggy does not look at him, or at Rayleigh, or at any of the others even though they’re standing right  _ there _ )

There’s a giant hiding behind one of the now destroyed towers, and a rag-tag group of pirates standing on the scaffold and looking down at them. But Crocus focuses on the man standing in the centre,the one with the scruffy black beard and the wide girth and the open mantle over a hairy torso, a large mouth and a crooked nose and long black hair under a tricorn hat.

Marshall D. Teach, aka “Blackbeard”. The fake D., the one Roger had had a bad feeling about, the reason behind this whole clusterfuck, the one who had captured Ace and handed him over to the marines in the first place.

Crocus recognises some of the others as well, of course, but none are as big of a danger as Teach right now.

Sengoku has stopped to yell at his subordinates, and Newgate himself is glaring at Teach in a way that makes Crocus want to wince. Ouch. Newgate is not just pissed off. He is  _ livid _ , and Crocus has never seen him like this and would have been happy going to his grave without seeing it.

“Hahahaha! Long time no see! Sure am glad I was able to make it in time to see you die, Old Man!”

…

Does the newcomer have a suicide wish or something? Even  _ Roger  _ would have hesitated to taunt Newgate in these conditions and Roger _had_ a fucking death wish!

“Teach!” Newgate  _ roars _ . “You are the only scum I would never call my son, Teach! You broke the one and only iron-clad rule on my ships... you killed your Nakama!”

Crocus flinches even as the remaining Shirohige pirates take positions at their father’s back, careful not to get in his way even though it’s obvious each of them wants their pound of flesh.

Especially the Phoenix, who has to be restrained by his fellows.

“Don't you interfere, Marco!” the one who dresses in kimonos, Izou, reminds the first division commander.

“In the Fourth Fleet's Commander's Thatch name, I'll take this idiot's life and settle things myself!” Newgate proclaims, and Crocus believes him even as he braces himself.

* * *

His eyes find Buggy again. With great difficulty: the former apprentice has used the distraction of Teach’s appearance and Newgate’s rage to step away, trying to hide in the thinning crowd, not that he was succeeding very well, what with everyone having witnessed him killing an admiral in cold blood just minutes ago.

(Yeah, no, Crocus has still not come to terms with that one either.)

(They are going to have a  _ conversation _ after this Davy Jones damn it)

(Crocus should not be feeling like their former cabin brat is a complete stranger damn it!)

* * *

“Zehahahaha!” Teach laughs as he jumps down from the platform, narrowly escaping its collapse as Newgate’s attack hit it straight on. “That's what I was hoping for!  _ Black hole _ !" he shouts, sprouting dark shadows that engulf the ground as he lands. “Thatch died... and Ace nearly died too, didn't he, old man! From the bottom of my heart, I respected you and I aspired after you, but you've gotten old! You couldn't even save one member of your crew from being executed, could you? Even though I brought him here from Banaro island alive! You had to rely on an outsider to do it for you!”

Teach pauses, ducks under Whitebeard’s swing, and then continues.

“A very  _ surprising  _ Outsider at that Zehahahahaha! How does it feel, Old Man? To be unable to save one of your men,  _ again _ , and have to watch as one of Roger’s left-over did the work for you? And not even one of the famous ones! Mind you, that Devil Fruit of his is really interesting, I wouldn’t mind taking a better look at it!”

And with that the pirate suddenly switches target, and Crocus curses but one of Teach’s men is in front of him before he can get to Buggy’s help, and Rayleigh is facing off against the former Impel Down Jailer and so are all of the Rogers that would be close enough to help, and Newgate is turning around but Teach has already crossed half the distance towards Buggy and…

* * *

 

And then there’s  _ pressure _ , heavy and dense and  _ crushing _ , so much that Crocus finds himself having trouble breathing, and it’s a good thing that all but the commanders have regained the ships by now because there’s no way a common pirate would have been able to withstand that kind of pressure, not if the way nearly  _ every single marine _ is suddenly unconscious on the ground and frothing at the mouth with the exceptions of the vice-admirals and of Sengoku himself, not with the way even some of Teach’s newest recruits, fresh out of Impel Down, look like they’ve just been hit in the face, and there’s a flash of red and black and silver, and Crocus knows this feeling, recognise it even if just barely, even if he has never before had the chance to feel its full blast, and it’s not like Rayleigh’s or even Rogers’, but it’s definitely King’s haki and this King, no, this  _ Emperor _ , is not playing around like his captain used to, like his first mate still often does, and there’s a slice in the air and a loud thud in the dudden silence as a severed arm hits the ground.

There’s the rustle of a dark cloak, the flash of a white shirt, and that unmistakable red hair - 

“Where I’m from, we look with our eyes, not with our hands,  _ Marshall D. Teach _ ,” a cold voice states as the dust settles. “Forget yourself again and you'll lose the other one.”


	15. Au moindre coup de Trafalgar C'est l'amitié qui prenait l'quart C'est elle qui leur montrait le nord Leur montrait le nord Et quand ils étaient en détresse Qu'leurs bras lancaient des S.O.S. On aurait dit les sémaphores Les copains d'abord

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Akagami No Shanks is standing between Buggy and the man who had been aiming for him, his Voice a mess of fury and worry and anger and guilt and protectiveness, screaming mine mine mine don’t you dare touch them they are MINE and Buggy knows that Shanks too is hovering on the edge, can read him perfectly despite the cold facade his friend is putting on, knows that this is the first time in over two decades that Shanks is completely sober, knows just what kind of toll that must be taking out of him, knows that they’re both going to shatter once this is over, but that’s okay because they’re Shanks-and-Buggy and Buggy-and-Shanks, and they have survived worse things, have made it through hell and walked out bleeding and battered but alive and they know how to put each other together again.
> 
> They will be alright.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Are you guys trying to make me smile so hard my face gets stuck that way? Because if so, it's working. You are the best readers a writer could wish for, and I love you so much. You have no idea how much your comments mean for me.
> 
> Shanks' POV is there to stay it seems! However, I'll endeavour to have at least some new material in each chapter to avoid a complete repetitive effect! His chapter will be the next one - in the meantime, have Buggy's !
> 
> Remember how I said Crocus was hard and I struggled to pass the 2.500 mark?
> 
> Buggy took all the words that Crocus didn't and then some. He had a lot to say.
> 
> Hope you'll like it!
> 
> ALSO: The amazing RancidMango/@envy-soda on tumblr has done a fantastic illustration of Shanks grabbing Buggy in some aggressive handholding and refusing to let go, something we had discussed in the comments! I'll try to add the link once I figure out how, but in the meantime you check it out on their blog or on mine (@stereden on tumblr as well ;) )
> 
> Anyway, I wish you a good reading !
> 
> Chapter specific warning: implied mention of attempted rape on children (nothing graphic and nothing actually happened and Roger dealt with the perpetrators. With prejudice)

_Au moindre coup de Trafalgar_  
_C'est l'amitié qui prenait l'quart_  
_C'est elle qui leur montrait le nord_  
_Leur montrait le nord_  
_Et quand ils étaient en détresse_  
_Qu'leurs bras lancaient des S.O.S._  
_On aurait dit les sémaphores_ _  
_ Les copains d'abord

_(At the slightest hit from Trafalgar_

_It was friendship who took the helm_

_She was the one who showed them the north_

_And when they were in danger_

_When their arms waved S.O.S._

_They looked like like semaphores_

_Friends first)_

 

_Les copains d’abord, Georges Brassens_

* * *

 

Everyone is staring at him and there’s a dead body in front of him and Buggy wants to be anywhere but here.

Akainu is dead and the kids are safe for now, dropped on the Piece of Spadille by the Phoenix who is even now flying as fast as he can back towards his father, and Buggy is _glad_ , glad that his intervention wasn’t for nothing, even as it takes all he has not to break down in the mother of all panic attacks right there and now.

Because he’s just killed an admiral in front of the entire _world_ , and it’s only a matter of time until they figure out that he had a hand (literally) in Kizaru’s death as well and he will never be able to get back to his normal life now. Not after this.

He won't be able to stay in East Blue any longer, will have no choice but to face the horrors of the Grand Line and the New World even though he had sworn them off for _a fucking reason_ , Davy Jones damn it, and he's going to be hunted again and...

It’s going to be those five years after Captain’s execution all over again, except this time he has people who depend on him, people he is _responsible_ for, who didn’t sign up to be hunted down with prejudice, who are not ready for this, for the clusterfuck Buggy has just unleashed upon them, whose lives rest upon his shoulders and fuck but what are they going to do because he knows his crew, knows their strengths and their weaknesses and they're good for East Blue but they're not ready for the Grand Line never mind the New World and if they try to stand up to the might of the marines they are going to get _slaughtered_ and…

He locks these thoughts away as black dots starts dancing across his vision, reminds himself to _breathe_. He can’t afford to have a breakdown now. Not until he’s safely away from this place.

( ~~All the planning in the world won’t help anyone if he’s too dead to set it in motion )~~

* * *

(Once, Buggy would have turned to the ocean to drown out the cacophony in his head, would have sought solace below the surface, allowed the water to muffle the sounds and wash away his anxieties enough for him to be able to function.)

(He never used to think of the ocean as being _dangerous_ to him before.)

(It’s the one thing Shanks will never forgive himself for, Buggy knows, even though Buggy himself forgave him long ago.)

* * *

Everyone is still staring at him but some people are moving too, and suddenly there’s a familiar presence at his back, and an imposing one at his side, and bright Voices surround him in an instant.

Rockstar is guarding his back, saber drawn and Voice still locked down tightly, and Newgate has finally gotten off his ass except that instead of making his way back to his crew and his anxious children the Earthshaker has decided to stand on Buggy’s left, like an equal, and that is a mindfuck and a half and yet another thing that Buggy will endeavour not to think about until he’s out of there. Because the implications are mind boggling and terrifying and Buggy does not need to add that to his pile of things to freak out about, thank you very much.

Then there’s the commanders too, Namur and Flower Sword Vista and Diamond Jozu and Water Buffalo Atmos and Izo and Haruta - some of whom Buggy had met way back then when he was still sailing with the Oro Jackson, others who had gained their captaincy in more recent years and that he only knows about from reading the newspapers and checking out the new bounty posters - all taking positions around him, and Jimbei and Ivankov and fuck, he knows he has just saved Firefist and Phoenix and Strawhat but why are they doing this? Why have they decided to protect him when he has given them the perfect opening to grab their people and get the hell out of here?

* * *

 

(It’s not that he’s complaining about the fact that they’ve apparently decided to protect him, because he was very much not looking forward to facing down the furious looking Sengoku all by himself, it’s just that…)

(He’s not used to people protecting him anymore.)

(Except for Shanks, because it’s _Shanks_ , and that’s why he isn’t too surprised to find Rockstar at his back even if part of him wants to yell at the man for putting himself in the limelight because of him, even if part of him is panicking because this is Shanks’s nakama and if he gets hurt or worse protecting him Buggy will never forgive himself.)

(But Buggy has never had so many people stepping between him and danger since he was still in the single digits and learning his way around a ship, since Gol D.Roger still shook the very seas with his existence, since Buggy still believed that his captain would always be there to protect him.)

* * *

 

There’s a shift behind him, deliberately loud enough to shake him out of his thoughts, and Buggy is not surprised that Rockstar is the one to speak first, voice deliberately pitched low enough that he’s the only one who can hear him despite his newfound entourage.

“Are you okay, Captain Buggy?”

And Buggy has to smother a laugh at that, because _really?_ That was the best Rockstar could come up with?

“What do you think, brat?” He replies sharply, eyes not leaving the seething form of the Fleet Admiral of the Marine.

A self-deprecating laugh.

“Yeah, that was a stupid question, wasn’t it? Urgh, Okashira is probably flipping his lid right now…”

“Tell me about it,” Buggy groans, because this, this he can do. “Freaking mother hen is never going to let me live this down…”

Shanks is never going to let him out of his sight again after this and to be honest right now Buggy does not see a single thing wrong with that.

Because Shanks is _Shanks_ , is _safety_ , is _home_ and everything that implies, and right now Buggy needs him more than he needs the air he’s breathing.

“He’s going to _slaughter_ anyone standing in his way until he gets there,” Rockstar cheerfully agrees, though there’s a darkly satisfied edge to his voice. “I will be _very_ surprised if there’s anything left of this island once he’s through with it.”

Because Shanks is nothing if not an overprotective bastard who does not take lightly to his precious people being threatened. Buggy would wonder where he got that from, except he knows it all too well.

(He was there, after all)

* * *

(Shanks got it from a gutter in a dirty city on a crowded island, from learning the hard way that if you couldn’t protect something it would be taken from you.)

(Shanks got it from the gutter, but he honed it by watching a man that was bigger than life itself when he stood between those who were _his_ and those who would harm them, by watching as their ~~father~~ captain slaughtered an entire army after three of the generals tried to force themselves upon the children he had chosen as _his._ )

(Shanks honed it by watching Gol D. Roger, but he _mastered it_ after the man’s head hit the ground, after the crew that was supposed to care for them abandoned them instead, after the world decided that Gol D. Roger’s legacies would not be tolerated any longer.)

* * *

“He’s such a drama queen,” He whines instead, because bantering like this is familiar, is easy enough that he can do it without thinking, but engaging that it distracts him from his impending freak-out nonetheless. “He won’t let us hear the end of it for leaving him out of the fun.”

There’s a low rumble from next to him, from the tall figure Buggy had been doing his very best to ignore up until now.

“I take it your captain is on his way as well, brat?” Edward Newgate asks Rockstar.

“Duh.” Said pirate deadpans. “Firefist is Luffy’s brother. There was no way Okashira was going to stay out of this, if only so he could tell you that he _fucking told you so_.”

Buggy wants to facepalm at that, he really does. And here he had thought that Rockstar was one of the more level headed ones… well, compared to the rest of that crew he might be, but that bar is _very low_. Benn Beckman doesn’t count. Buggy is still low-key certain that the man must have been a saint in a previous life for managing to both put up with and keep that particular band of idiots alive and in one piece for so long.

Pun _not_ intended.

Thankfully, Newgate doesn’t take offence to that, or at least not outwardly. His Voice is agitated enough that Buggy can’t make out the specifics, but at least the anger he’s currently feeling is not directed at either of them.

Good. Buggy would much rather avoid getting in an actual fight with an Emperor on top of all the bullshit that happened to him today.

“Garararara!” The man guffaws instead, because of fucking course he would. Ugh. Fucking monsters and their fucking unpredictable behaviour: they’re giving him a migraine just to think about it. Thank Davy Jones Newgate wasn’t a D. on top of that: the man is bad enough as it is. “You’ve got guts, brat, I will give you that. Better watch that mouth of yours, though, it will get you in trouble one day, no doubt about that!”

“I will take that under consideration, old man,” Rockstar replies cheekily, and Buggy sighs.

“How does Benn put up with you?” He asks wearily.

“Alcohol. Loads and loads of alcohol,” Rockstar grins, and Buggy is about to snark back when he is interrupted.

“Doke no Buggy.”

Buggy does not freeze as Whitebeard addresses him directly for the second time that day, but it’s a close thing. Especially since this is probably the first time in his entire life that the man has called him by his actual name.

“Newgate.”

The old man isn’t looking at him, both of them keeping their eyes locked on the platform where Sengoku is finally starting to move, barking orders left and right as he tries to shake his men out of their shock.

“You saved my precious sons’ lives. You have my thanks.”

There’s the faintest rustle of movement, and Buggy’s haki is supplying him with the information before he can even register it.

Edward Newgate is inclining his head respectfully towards him, the closest to a formal bow a man of his position will ever come to.

“I didn’t do it for _you_ ,” Buggy snaps at him, because he does _not_ need the added complication of earning an Emperor’s respect on top of everything he’s already dealing with.

(He knows he's already got the respect of the only Yonkou he cares about. Better yet, knows he's got the _friendship_ of the only Yonkou worth a damn and that's more than enough for him.)

“I just didn’t want to deal with Shanks’s whining if his protege got himself killed on my watch! Or with Blackjack Fucking D. Rouge fighting her way out of Davy Jones’ locker to kill me herself if I allowed her son to die without even trying to save him!”

He shudders at the very thought.

(Because he does not for a single moment doubt that she would be capable of doing so.)

(The woman had been _terrifying_ in life, he does not doubt that she is even _worse_ in death and he’s not signing himself up for being haunted by that particular menace, thank you very much!)

* * *

(He doesn't say it, but he did it for Captain too, not for the pirate king but for the man who let him hide in his cabin when he was scared, for the man who stood between him and danger more than once, who held him when he had nightmares and rocked him back to sleep when he woke up _screaming_ , who would have _loathed_ what has become of the world, how the marines slaughtered children in the name of riding the seas of his legacy, how they hunted down his apprentices because they couldn't kill him twice.)

(He did it for Ace, for the boy who grew up knowing the world wanted him dead, who fought to earn himself a family when it should have been a given, who finally found one only for the marines to attempt to rip him away for him, for the boy who just wanted to know that he deserved to _live_.)

(He did it for Shanks, for the brat his friend took under his wing but also for the brat his friend used to be, all of fourteen and trying to make a brave face as his world crumbled around him, left behind by those who should have protected him and hunted by those who wanted him dead, for the broken teenager who fought tooth and nail to keep what little he had left, who pieced himself back together as best as he could, who rose to the top through desperation tinted determination, who hasn't been sober in two decades because old scars hurt the longest.)

(He did it for himself, for the five year old boy who was left to die in a gutter, for the seven years old thief who found himself a ~~father to love him~~ captain to follow, for the eight years old cabin brat who cried when he realised his ~~father~~ captain was _dying_ , for the ten years old apprentice who crawled in his ~~father's~~ captain's arms and sobbed after the Edd War, for the twelve years old pirate who saw Raftel and too much and hid in his ~~father's~~ captain's cabin until the world made something vaguely resembling sense again, for the twelve years old _child_ who watched his ~~father~~ captain walk away and knew they would never talk again, for the fourteen years old _orphan_ who watched as they beheaded his ~~father~~ captain and could do _nothing_ , for the teenager that was thrown to the wolves with only his best friend for company and barely made it, who shattered in so many pieces it's a miracle he managed to put himself together again, for the young adult who found himself all alone _and burned-and-drowned_ and still doesn't know how he survived, for the man he is today, because he can be the adult he wishes he had had back then and he _refuses_ to fail _like his crew failed him_ _.)_

* * *

 

Newgate laughs again, and Buggy is sorely tempted to kick him in the shin, no matter how childish the urge. It’s about the only part of the man can reach without detaching his limbs, and he’s not weakening himself for any reason right now.

“Aye, she would, wouldn’t she? Though I do believe her crew is currently enjoying giving the marines a reminder of just why they shouldn’t have erased their captain from the narrative.”

Buggy winces at the thought, even as he finds himself checking the whereabouts of those particular hellions with his Observation Haki, relaxing only minutely when he locates them closer to the edge of the plaza, far away from him, wreaking havoc and keeping the remaining Shichibukai busy as they make for the Black Maria now that Firefist has been extracted from the battlefield. Which coincidentally means that the Shichibukai are _far away from him_ , so that's two birds in one stone and he's definitely not complaining.

Then he gapes when something elses registers to his senses.

Is that…

Yes, it _is_ a ship _running on the fucking plaza_ , paddles working as legs to move across the stone as easily as across the waves, mowing through the assembled marines who had only just begun gathering their wits again.

And there’s people standing on top of the bloody thing, because of course they are, and of fucking course it has to be Vortex Spider Squardo and his crew, because that’s his life now.

“For the record,” Buggy states, voice completely flat. “Your kids are _insane_ , Newgate.”

There’s no reply from the Strongest Man in the World, but the way his Voice twists and turns when Squardo opens his mouth is answer enough.

Fucking Whitebeards. Fucking over dramatic bastards, it's a freaking miracle that there's only one D. in the lot because they're certainly all acting like one.

(Roger would have been _howling_ with laughter right now, Buggy thinks, as it's both nostalgic and bitter.)

 _(Fucking_ _D.'s!)_

“Old man! Please let everyone get away! We'll undertake this battlefield!”

“Squardo!” Another Shirohige pirate screams. “It's the Maelstrom spider pirates! Those bastards... Don't be a fool Squardo! Do you have a death wish?”

More like a guilt eating him alive, Buggy muses even as he keeps his attention focused on the execution platform where he can literally feel Sengoku’s blood pressure rise by the second. Idly, he wonders if he might be lucky enough to have the Gensui die of a heart attack on the spot. That would certainly make things a lot easier, and that one he could definitely shift the blame off onto the Shirohige. Then again, with the way his luck has been yanking him around lately, he probably shouldn't count on it. Too bad.

“Hell yeah I do, after what I did to the old man! Even if it doesn't atone for my sins! This is the only thing that will satisfy me! You have Ace, now get outta here, everyone!”

 _Called it,_ Buggy sighs. Idiot. As if Newgate is going to let him do something like that, stupid bleeding heart that he is.

And yep, there the man goes, standing even taller than before as he stops the ship with one hand and bellows for the world to hear.

“Do you know how disobedient it is for a child to die before his father? Don't you get it, Squardo? Don't be so full of yourself! That little stab of yours didn't shake my life one bit! Everyone has their own life span... We've done what we came for. Now, there's no more reason for us to be here! What I am about to tell you now... is my final "captain's order"! Listen carefully, Whitebeard pirates!”

* * *

Aaaand now Buggy wishes he could turn off his hearing because he does not need to hear this.

(Because this is what he never got the chance to hear from his own father captain’s mouth)

(Because this is bringing back images of another scaffold, of another man standing before his crew as Death walks beside him, of a one last burst of Haki that washed over him and carried things forever left unsaid)

(Because Gol D.Roger never got to give his final captain’s order and Buggy still hates him for it.)

* * *

“Final... wait a minute old man! Don't say such a thing!”

“We don't wanna hear stuff like that!”

“We're all going to return to the New World together, right!?”

* * *

 

(Because those are words Buggy never got to say, because his ~~father~~ captain promised he would come back and never did.)

(Because Buggy’s grief has never quite abated, and the despair and sorrow in the Shirohige’s Voices only serves to fan its flames.)

(Because Buggy can’t afford to turn down his Observation Haki and so has to keep _feeling_ everything they do.)

* * *

 

“Old man!” And that’s Firefist Voice, and he’s easy to find, clinging to the Piece of Spadille’s railing even as those eerily identical triplets hold him back.

“This is where you and I split up!” Newgate proclaims, standing proud with his back to his children, a testament to the strength of an Era that will not go quietly into the night. “Every single one of you! Stay alive at all costs! Return to the New World in one piece!”

“O... Old man?! You're planning on dying here?”

Of course he is, Buggy wants to scream. He has been dying for months if not years already, has been holding on because he could not bear to abandon his children, but if the choice is between his life and his children? This is Edward Newgate, for fuck’s sake. There is no way he would chose his own life over theirs.

* * *

 

Buggy really, really wants to punch him. The old man had had the perfect opportunity to leave with his children and he had wasted it, and Buggy is _seething_.

(Can’t he see that they need him? Can’t he see that they’re not ready to be left on their own? Can’t he see that they’re not ready to live in a world without him?)

(Can’t he see that he’s hurting them?)

* * *

“I'm a remnant of my era! There ain't no ship that's going to carry me out to the new one! Go on! All you bastards!”

“Nooo! Old Maaaaaaan!”

* * *

Their pain is resonating all around him, and Buggy has to brace himself, to ground himself by focusing on Rockstar’s steady presence behind him, on the hints of Shanks’ haki that still cling to the man, to avoid drowning in it. Rockstar, thankfully, notices it and presses closer, their backs touching, the contact one more anchor to stop Buggy from losing it.

(Second favourite for _a reason.)_

* * *

“That's a captain's order! Get outta here!”

“Uncle?!” And that’s Strawhat, awake again despite his previous loss of consciousness because D's are bullshit like that, clinging to Firefist’s arm even as he stares at Newgate.

“Old Man!”

Newgate looks over the battlefield, over the marines who are scrambling to get back into something resembling order, and Buggy takes a deep breath and steadies himself. He knows that tense set in the man’s shoulders, recognises it from his own captain, knows that there’s a speech coming and that he needs to be ready for it.

“Whitebeard!” Sengoku roars, recognising the signs as well and trying to stop it before it can start.

But Newgate is not called the Earthshaker for nothing, and nothing can stop a tsunami once it has begun.

“This ended up being one hell of a long journey... What do you say we settle things once and for all... marines!”

“Pops!”

“Don't leave us alone, Pops! Let's go back together! Pops!”

* * *

Buggy breathes deeply, in and out and in and out again, chases the images of the last time his captain stood on the Oro Jackson and told them he was leaving.

* * *

“Did you not hear it is a captain's order?! Go now! Idiots!”

They’re crying and sobbing and screaming, but the Shirohige obey their captain, running back towards their remaining ships, the commanders the only exception as they hold their ground around Buggy and Newgate, while the marines are still reeling from the many shocks that have been thrown their way today.

“Hurry! Follow Pop's words! Pops!”

“OYAJI!” Firefist is not giving up, screaming for his father at the top of his lungs, and Buggy’s heart breaks a little more.

* * *

(He had wanted to scream so badly, that day, but he couldn't, couldn't risk the marines recognizing them, had bitten his lips so badly he had pierced the skin, can still feel the scar in his mouth, to stop himself from making a single sound, torrents of tears rolling down his face.)

(He never got the chance to scream his _grief_ _rage pain anger fury loss loneliness_ _._ )

(He still feels like screaming now.)

* * *

 

Newgate chuckles, and both of his voices are tinged with the deep love he has for his children.

* * *

(One last wave of haki, rushing over him even as the swords come down, one last wave full of love and pride and then nothing.)

* * *

“No need to speak. Just answer me one question, Ace... Am I... a good father?”

* * *

(A good father doesn’t die in front of his kids, Buggy wants to yell. A good father recognizes that his life stopped belonging to him the day he agreed to take in _~~a~~ ~~couple~~ ~~of~~ ~~street~~ ~~rats~~ _ over a hundred souls and call them _his_.)

(A good father doesn’t leave his children with the guilt of not being able to save him.)

* * *

“Of course!” Ace roars back, and there’s tears in that voice and he feels _so much_ that it’s all Buggy can do not to break down then and there. Guilt and grief and sorrow and self-loathing, and it’s _too much_.

“Gurararara!” Newgate laughs, and the pride he feels for his children is enough to at least buffer Buggy somewhat, steadies him enough to notice that Sengoku is done waiting and has taken matters in his own hands, is jumping down from the platform and rushing straight towards them - no, not them, towards _him_ , because Buggy is the one who just killed an admiral and interrupted the execution of the Pirate King’s son so of course he has to die first.

And Sengoku is not the only one moving, Buggy can feel Crocus and Rayleigh and Gulliver and Seagull fight their way through the crowd and there are bullets raining down the sky in Sengoku’s path and Buggy does not know how to react because _why why now why do they suddenly care_ but then Newgate is moving to, warping the air in front of him and collapsing buildings by the dozen.

“You’re as much of a relic as I am, Sengoku!” The Earth-shaker calls out. “At least have the guts to fight someone from your Era!”

A second later, Sengoku is back in full Buddha mode and Newgate is laughing like the lunatic he is as he raises his bisento.

Urgh. Fucking Monsters. But far be it for Buggy to step in if the two biggest monsters currently on the battlefield want to fight each other.

 

No.

 

Not the two biggest monsters.

 

There’s another one, hiding behind the tower behind the scaffold, and Buggy has never met him before but some of the Voices around him he recognises from his time in Impel Down and he very much wishes he didn’t.

Because there’s one man who should have been there since the beginning and yet hasn’t shown himself yet, one man who was dangerous enough to put three scars across Shanks’ face, one man without whom none of this would be happening.

Marshall D. Teach. The false D., Shanks had called him, and his Voice feels slimy and slippery, dark and twisted and it makes Buggy feel sick just from glancing at it from a distance.

They've been there for a short while now, not since the start though, but as they've been content to just watch until now Buggy had kept a metaphorical eye on them and focused on more urgent matters. But they are getting agitated, bloodlust tinging their Voices, and he can't afford to ignore them any longer.

* * *

“We seem to have uninvited guests,” Buggy warns because Newgate needs to know about this if he hasn’t felt them yet, just as Crocus comes to a stop a few steps away from him, joined seconds later by Rayleigh, Seagull and Scopper Gaban appearing on his other side.

Every single one of them is staring at him like they've never seen him before, like they want to grab him and shake him and ask him a thousand questions.

Buggy ignores them, focuses on the cluster of Voices that is now stepping up onto the scaffold proper instead.

(He is so not dealing with _that_ right now. _)_

(Nope nope nope.)

(He has more important things to focus on.)

(Chief amongst them the group of monsters coming into sight.)

* * *

“Oh? So someone finally noticed us?” Someone guwaffs. “Aren’t you an interesting one?”

Buggy feels Rockstar tense at his back, feels the cold fury that courses through Newgate's veins, and braces himself for the fallout.

Great. Fucking great.

Marshall Fucking D. Teach finds him _interesting_. And just when he thought this day couldn’t possibly get worse, too!

He does _not_ need that kind of attention Davy Jones damn it!

Firefist’s Voice is a roaring inferno, but thankfully Buggy can also feel the Voices of the boy’s crew around him, physically restraining him, and Strawhat is obviously in no condition to get back to the battlefield if only because there’s a giant cat sitting on him making sure he’s going nowhere. Good. One less thing to worry about. Blackbeard defeated the brat once already, no need for Firefist to go and get himself captured again.

There’s a giant hiding behind one of the now destroyed towers, and a rag-tag group of pirates standing on the scaffold and looking down at them. Buggy recognises most of them, from their wanted posters and the rumors in Impel Down, and he has to repress the urge to take a step back.

_Fuck fuck fuck fuck!_

* * *

‘The Supersonic’ Van Augur, a tall man with a weird hat, cape and a rifle on his shoulder. One of the best snipers in the world, probably on par with Benn Beckmann and Yasopp, loath as Shanks would be to admit it.

Jesus Burgess, a mountain of a man and a wrestler with the habit of throwing buildings at people when bored.

A guy in a tap dancing outfit, eerily pale and smiling like one of those damn mimes that Buggy hates, complete with top hat and wooden cane.

A sickly looking old man wielding a double bladed scythe who Buggy doesn’t recognise either, sitting on a horse of all things.

Shiryu of the Rain, the former head jailer whose horrors stories had been amongst the first Buggy had heard when he arrived at Impel Down, in uniform and smoking a cigar with no care in the world, one hand on the pommel of the sword hanging at his side.

‘Colossal Battleship’ Sanjuan Wolf, ‘Heavy Drinker’ Vasco Shot, ‘Crescent Moon Hunter’ Catarina Devon, ‘Corrupt King’ Avalo Pizarro.

Fuck, but Blackbeard had recruited monsters. And this time Buggy means it literally. Those people had been erased from history for a reason, even the pirates who remembered them, few as they were because the marines had been _very_ thorough, were glad to see them behind bars for Davy Jones’ sake!

And their fucking captain should have been locked up in the deepest level of Hell too! This might be the first time Buggy sees the man in person, but he’s just as creepy as Shanks described him. Buggy needs a fucking shower just from being on the same island as him, that's how disgusting the man’s aura is.

* * *

Beside him, the two behemoths have stopped their fight. Sengoku is yelling at his subordinates, wanting to find out how the hell the Blackbeards had managed to get inside Marineford without anyone noticing, as if that is the most important thing to worry about right now, but at least that means that the Gensui has moved away from Buggy, which is good news, and Newgate has gone completely still as he glares at Blackbeard in a way that’s terrifyingly reminiscent of Captain’s expression right before he mowed through an entire army on his apprentices’ behalfs.

(It’s simultaneously reassuring and terrifying.)

( _~~Fuck but Buggy misses him)~~ _

* * *

~~~~“Hahahaha! Long time no see! Sure am glad I was able to make it in time to see you die, Old Man!”

Fucking D.’s. Especially this one.

No fucking self preservation instincts and being an asshole like that should have meant that evolution would have made sure that he wouldn’t survive to adulthood, but noooo, D’s are too fucked up for even Darwin’s laws to have any effect on them.

_Fucking D.’s._

* * *

“Teach!” Newgate _roars_. “You are the only scum I would never call my son, Teach! You broke the one and only iron-clad rule on my ships... you killed your Nakama!”

Buggy feels his blood boil again at the mention of Teach’s crimes. Nakama-killers… the Rogers had left him behind and never looked back, but at least they had never actively tried to kill him ~~(~~ ~~_a door slamming shut even as he begs for help doesn’t count_ ~~ _)_ . To betray his comrades, especially in a crew as tight-knit as the Shirohige, where they are more than nakamas, they are _family_ …

Well. If Buggy thought he had a chance and was stupid enough to step between a furious Newgate and the man who killed one of his children, he might have tried to take his own pound of flesh out of the bastard’s hide. The other commanders certainly look like they want to try, from the way two of them have to physically restrain the Phoenix to keep him from rushing at the traitor.

“Don't you interfere, Marco!” the cross-dresser from Wano, Izou, reminds the first division commander.

“In the Fourth Fleet's Commander's Thatch name, I'll take this idiot's life and settle things myself!” Newgate proclaims, and Buggy uses the distraction to try and slip away from the centre of attention, Rockstar staying close to him.

It’s harder than it should have been, because everyone just witnessed him execute a fucking _admiral_ moments ago, but Buggy is willing to take whatever he can get at this point.

* * *

He keeps an eye on the advancing enemy, but his attention is quickly caught by something at the edge of his range, something moving _very fast_ and straight towards _him_ , and he does his best to repress the overwhelming surge of _relief_ that runs through him as he recognises that Voice.

~~_Shanks Shanks SHANKS ShAnKs sHaNkS_ ~~

~~_He is there he is he here i am not alone not anymore not this time thank whoever is up there_ ~~

* * *

“Zehahahaha!” Teach laughs, forcing Buggy to focus on him again as he jumps down from the platform, narrowly escaping its collapse as Newgate’s attack hit it straight on. “That's what I was hoping for! _Black hole_!" he shouts, sprouting dark shadows that engulf the ground as he lands. “Thatch died... and Ace nearly died too, didn't he, old man! From the bottom of my heart, I respected you and I aspired after you, but you've gotten old! You couldn't even save one member of your crew from being executed, could you? Even though I brought him here from Banaro island alive! You had to rely on an outsider to do it for you!”

Teach pauses, ducks under Whitebeard’s swing, and then continues.

“A very _surprising_ Outsider at that Zehahahahaha! How does it feel, Old Man? To be unable to save one of your men, _again_ , and have to watch as Roger’s left-over did the work for you? And not even one of the famous ones!”

Buggy sees red at that, because he _is no one’s leftover damn it_ , he might not have wanted to be as famous as the rest of his crew but he is his own person, not just an offshoot of Gol D. Roger and...

“Mind you, that Devil Fruit of his is really interesting, I wouldn’t mind taking a better look at it!”

And then Buggy is backing away as fast as he can because Blackbeard has switched target and his men have spread out around him, preventing anyone from coming to his help, even Rockstar who is facing off against the Corrupt King himself, and Blackbeard is nearly on him, dark shadows curling around his hands and Buggy should be freaking out but he isn’t because...

* * *

(He isn’t alone anymore)

(This is still a clusterfuck and he still hates it and he’s still on the cusp of a breakdown but)

(Shanks is _here.)_

(And Shanks is safety is home is _Shanks_ is _there_ and Buggy finally feels like he can finally _breathe_.)

* * *

A presence, warm and comforting wrapping itself around him even as it slams into the people around him like a tsunami, bowling them over, pressing them into the ground through sheer _pressure,_ felling the weaker marines in one blow and leaving only the vice-admirals and higher standing. There’s rage and worry and fierce protectiveness all mixed together, a whirlwind of emotions condensed into a titanium _Will_ that will tolerate no opposition.

* * *

(The world sees Shanks and they don’t think _dangerous_ . They see him and they think _drunk harmless ridiculous how the hell did he become a Yonko?_ )

(They don’t see the Emperor, they see a fool and a joke but the joke’s on them.)

(Just because Shanks rarely shows it doesn’t mean he’s not capable of being completely _ruthless_ when he deems it necessary.)

(And if there’s one thing Shanks has managed to get through Buggy’s hard skull in all the years they have known each other, it’s that Buggy being threatened is a sure way of bringing the _Emperor_ to the forefront.)

(Gol D. Roger may have been the Pirate _King_ , content to do what he wanted and bringing his crew along for the ride, but Akagami no Shanks is an _Emperor_ , a _conqueror_ hidden under an easy going facade, and he will guard his Empire with all his might.)

* * *

A familiar Voice curling around him and Rockstar, shielding them from its effects as red and black and silver fly over him, landing noiselessly between Buggy and Blackbeard, followed seconds later by the deafening thud of a severed arm hitting the ground as a sabre flashes through the air.

Akagami No Shanks is standing between Buggy and the man who had been aiming for him, his Voice a mess of fury and worry and anger and guilt and protectiveness, screaming _mine mine mine don’t you dare touch them they are MINE_ and Buggy knows that Shanks too is hovering on the edge, can read him perfectly despite the cold facade his friend is putting on, knows that this is the first time in over two decades that Shanks is _completely sober_ , knows just what kind of toll that must be taking out of him, knows that they’re both going to _shatter_ once this is over, but that’s okay because they’re Shanks-and-Buggy and Buggy-and-Shanks, and they have survived worse things, have made it through _hell_ and walked out bleeding and battered but _alive_ and they know how to put each other together again.

_They will be alright._

* * *

Buggy can feel the shock radiating off everyone on the plaza, the resignation coming from a certain sword wielding asshole Shichibukai as he turns around and makes for where his ship is moored on the other side of the island, refusing to even entertain the idea of fighting against Shanks because he’s an _ableist asshole_ who thinks that just because Shanks lost an arm means that he’s not a swordsman anymore and Buggy knows he’s rambling in his own head, high on relief and hysteria as he takes in the strong back of his best friend, the brilliant red hair, the crimson blood on the haki-glistening sword, the shell-shocked gaping form of Blackbeard as he stares at the stump where his arm used to be, sliced off cleanly halfway between elbow and shoulder, not quite comprehending what just happened.

* * *

(Shanks just happened.)

(Buggy is so relieved he feels like he could burst into laughter. Or tears. Either or.)

(It’s been that kind of day.)

* * *

 

There’s a smattering of familiar new Voices dashing towards them, still at the edge of his range - and fuck but did Shanks ditch them and use Soru and Geppo to get here faster? Buggy wouldn't put it past his friend right now -  but Shanks’s sheer presence muffles them, wraps around them and hides them with his own, making it hard for anyone not as sensitive to Haki as Buggy is to pinpoint their exact location.

Not that anyone is trying, too busy staring at the Yonkou that appeared out of nowhere.

* * *

“Where I’m from, we look with our eyes, not with our hands, _Marshall D. Teach_ ,” a cold voice states as the dust settles. “Forget yourself again and lose the other one.”

Despite himself, Buggy finds himself grinning widely.

_You always have to make an entrance, don’t you?_

(And if his smile is a bit watery on the edges, well.)

(Who gives a damn?)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Buggy had a lot to say, didn't he? Let me know what you thought!


End file.
